We are trying to figure out what to see, places to go, etc after we leave Barcelona in late May. The first three days/nights we are staying in barcelona and want to do a day trip to Montserrat. After this we are trying to determine where to go -- the last 2 days of the trip will be in Penedes doing a wine bike tour.
Does anyone have any suggestions? We have 4 days to play with for other ideas.... We're looking for a beach town for one day, maybe Girona another day, Tarragona., etc.... I think we have too many places we want to see and not enough time. Our total trip is arriving 5/22, afternoon and flying out 5/30 morning.

Sitges ( beaches), Girona, Tarragona are all easy day trips from Barcelona.

What about Tossa de Mar? We are thinking of going to the northern beaches once we leave Barcelona and go to girona from the northern area - any suggestions? Lloret, Tossa, etc...thanks

L'Estartit beach was huge golden soft sand.

We spent part of our honeymoon in Cadaques, at the Hotel Rocamar, and loved it. The town is fairly isolated (narrow, twisty road down to the water) which seems to limit tourist traffic a bit. It is a pretty seaside town that seems to have retained some of its authentic charm as a fishing village while also capturing some of the style of the artist's community it once was in the first part of the 20th century. It was about a 3 hour drive from Barcelona, very close to France, and we stopped en route in Girona (an interesting, walled town).

Oops, I should have mentioned that I don't recall it having wide, sandy beaches - more like small, rocky coves - but still very pretty.

Where is L'Estartit beach? The closest big town?

My husband and I visited Lloret de Mar 25 years ago when we were living in Germany. We got a very cheap bus trip w/ hotel there and used it as our first stop in Spain. We used it as a base for Barcelona and Girona and found it so depressing we left a day early. Very built up then and I can only suppose it has gotten much worse since.