Where to stay? Casa Gracia - Barcelona

Casa Gracia was probably one of the coolest, best hostels, I have ever stayed at! The first great thing about it was its location - very central right by Via Gracia, one of the main avenues in central Barcelona.
This hostal is in a restored old building with one of those cute old elevators, tall decorated ceilings with columns everywhere. We were a big group so we booked a room for everyone which made our stay very cheap (I think we paid like 10€ a night with breakfast). The room and all the common areas were beautiful, the decoration was very nice – if you just walked in, there was no way you would think you could stay in that place for 10€ a night! There was also a kitchen where you could cook your meals and our room had its own bathroom.

Very nice staff: these people are the coolest, they will very kindly check you in and are available any time to help you find cool places to eat, go out and visit.


Casa Gracia’s organization and activities

I had been to Barcelona before and done pretty much all there was to do as a tourist, so I was looking for something a little different to do with my time. This hostel offered a free city tour, given by a student of the Architecture University of Barcelona. This guy was very nice and managed to give us a nice walking tour of the places he found were the coolest in the city. So instead of the touristic places, we found ourselves going into tight alleys with hidden beautiful fountains, less famous but marvelous churches and secret squares with a lot of nearly forgotten history. Also he shared with us some of Catalan’s funny culture such as the Caganers.
Besides the free tours, they have planned out for you several other activities that will make your stay very pleasant! Movie nights, pub crawls and many others I am sure, only these are the ones I remember.

Environment and crowd of the Casa Gracia

Morning breakfast is served in their beautiful living room which is also the common area where people meet and get together. As the group I was with decided to stay in sleeping, after our late night out on the previous day, I was left alone to explore Barcelona. Very quickly I found several other travelers, some who were there by themselves, others in a group, all of them super friendly which made this trip a lot of fun. I ended up having one of the best weekends ever.
After breakfast me and the rest of all the random travelers went on the free tour around the city, we then grabbed lunch together. In the evening we ended up having a late afternoon drinks in the common area of the hostel. By then my group was back and we all head out to dinner and then to some bars.
I really recommend this hostel to anyone visiting Barcelona who is looking for a good time and a chance to meet cool friendly people.

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