side trips from barcelona
 

has anyone taken a side trip to griona, figueres or montserrat. can you do griona and figueres in one day? is it worth the trip

thank you

It's really hard to answer your question without knowing your interests. Girona is a lovely atmospheric place with a fantastic cathedral and historic center, and great food. I could spend days there. Most people go to Figueres because they are interested in Salvador Dali. (I've never been.)

People seem to enjoy the views and hikes around Montserrat. Some like the choir in the church, or perhaps the architecture itself. I don't think it's so special.

What do you really like to do and what time of year are you going? How long will be in Barcelona?

Also - will you have a car or are you relying on public transportation?

If you're relying on public transport you wouldn't want to try this in one day.

In my opinion Girona really deserves a nice day in itself. I love this little city on the river banks.

thanks for your response we will be in barcelona in sept for 6days and we like to sight see on our own we do not spend alot of time at religious sites. we are using public transportation.

Girona has an atmospheric old barrio in addition to its spectacular cathedral, but if you would like a fascinating town to visit with an extraordinary architectural history and museum of Catalonian art, consider the town of Vic, which is only an hour away. It has a fantastic central large plaza (which on some days is a market) with buidings that stretch from the pre-Renaissance through the Renaissance to Baroque and Modernismo. it also has a Roman temple plus perhaps the most important museum of Catalonian art going back to the greeks and to the 20th c.

There are buses and trains to Vic. Ask at your hotel or the tourist for the best route from your location.

After our arrival in Barcelona we found a brochure at our hotel about a day trip by bus that combined Girona and Figueres. We ended up doing that and were pleased with it - you can do them both by train but the service is not all that frequent. Also because we were part of a tour group we were able to get into the Dali museum - we met some other Figueres visitors that had come up on the train and then were not able to be admitted to the museum - if you go on your own, you may want to find out if you can buy the tickets ahead of time. We enjoyed out time in both Girona and Figueres (well that was mostly the museum) and the day tour worked for us. I think it was around 100E per person - check the TI or your hotel for brochures.