deztwotone

Hey Fodor's!

I am trying to plan a trip to Figueres from Barcelona and am just wondering if the trip would take a full day or half a day? This is because a Figueres trip would best fit when I have a late visit to La Sagrada Familia (at 5:30 pm) or the following day when I could devote the whole day to visiting Figueres.

As for my plan once I'm in Figueres, I'm not really sure what I will do beyond visit the Dali-Theater Museum.

Thank you in advance for any advice!

Pvoyageuse

There isn't much to see in Figueres apart from the Dali Museum and the Rambla (Art Nouveau architecture). Half a day should be enough unless you have a car and want to visit the area. However there is a huge open air market on Thursdays morning.

Rubicund

I'd go early and make a day of it. Once you've seen the museum,

http://www.salvador-dali.org/museus/...dali/en_index/

drive across to Portlligat and see Dali's house, now a museum too.

http://www.salvador-dali.org/museus/...t/en_historia/

From there, drive back down the coast road to Barcelona stopping wherever takes your fancy round the Bay of Roses and then maybe Tossa before heading back to the city.

To just visit the museum in Figueres alone, is a good 2 1/2 hours each way, so that's 5 hours before you account for the time at Figueres.

kja

How strong is your interest in Dali? As Rubicund notes, if it is a passion, you can easily spend a very full day visiting sites associated with his work, and you might want to visit a few other places to round out your trip. If Dali is of only passing interest, you might not even want to take the time to get to / from Figueres...

I think I've seen another post (or more?) from you about your time in the area. I'm sure other Fodorites will see it differently, but FWIW, I find it difficult to respond to questions about timing and priorities without any context -- how long will you be in the area? What are your interests? What is your preferred pace of travel?

Again, just for what little it's worth, I spent about one-and-a-half hours at the Teatro Museo Dali and then another 1/2 hour at Dali-Jewels. I am not a great fan of Dali, but I do find his work interesting. I have no regrets about my time in these museums, particularly because I had to pass through Figueres, and so stopping there made for a good break from what would have been a long day of driving. But again, context is everything: I have had the privilege of easy access to many works by Dali over the years.

The time it took me to visit the Teatro Museo reflects not only my interest, but also the crowds I encountered there in late May -- lines to get into specific rooms were not at all uncommon. I did not think the Teatro Museo an ideal exhibit space -- the access to various rooms was limited and the corridors that would have lined the loges were, to my thinking, too narrow to accommodate the crowds. That said, the larger exhibit spaces, like the former stage, were well suited (IMO) to communicating the artist's vision. And I did see some memorable works -- some that are now among my favorites by Dali!

Hope that helps!

deztwotone

I will be spending about 5 whole days in Barcelona. Most of my activities in the city aren't really planned out but for now I'm just trying to figure out if I have the time to see some of the main attractions. I will try and work on fleshing out the context of any of my future posts.

With that said, I really do enjoy Dali's work and would like to spend time exploring the museum. I have also seen many of his works in person and find him and his work interesting. But I will not be renting a car while I'm in Barcelona, so I'll be relying on the train to get me to Figueres. It seems like there is a high speed train that will get me there in one hour. But I would have to use a bus to get to either Cadaques or Pubol and I hear they are a bit unreliable.

So I will probably stick to traveling to only Figueres for a day trip. Seems like, with the high speed train, it can be done in half a day.

Thank you everyone for the information! And thanks kja, I have seen you reply to a few of my posts, they are always helpful

kja

I'm glad you have found my replies to be helpful -- and thanks for saying so!