Buses, Barcelona

We did not travel by public transport as the tour we were on included a trip to Parc Montjuic.

Whilst waiting to enter the park I noticed a public bus arrive which had the sign Pl Catalunya to Parc Montjuic. Bus number 55 will get you there, so if you are fit there is no need to pay for a tour.

We got to Barcelona by bus. We left Salamanca in mid-morning and arrived around 10-11 hours later, after sundown. The bus stopped once or twice during the long trip to give us a pee break. Then after we arrived, we proceded to search for accommodations, which is a whole other story...

During my first visit to Barcelona (quick 7 hours) before meeting my friend, renting a car and heading south, I decided to use the Aerobus for ease and price.

The Aerobus is one of the easiest and cheapest ways of getting to and from Barcelona Airport. The Bus runs two routes from the Airport, A1 and A2, depending on your arrival terminal. The tickets are sold either at a ticket "stand/vending machine" prior to boarding the bus, or the driver will sell you the ticket. At T1 there are no vending machines and tickets must be purchased by the bus driver (he stands outside the bus). Buses run every 5 min 365 days a year (according to their website).

I arrived at T1 and hopped on the bus to Placa Catalunya. It was a pleasant ride into the city. Depending on time of day and traffic the ride can take anywhere from 1/2 hour to 45 minutes.

Ticket prices are €5.90 for a single and €10.20 for return (as of 3/2015).

Here is the Route for the A1 from the airport: (Note, Placa Catalunya is the last stop)

Airport, T1
Plaça Espanya (Torres Venecianas)
Gran Via - Urgell
Plaça Universitat
Plaça Catalunya (City Centre)

From the City Center:
Plaça Catalunya (City Centre)
Sepúlveda - Urgell
Plaça Espanya (Creu Coberta)
Airport, T1

For more information check out their website.

One thing I have always liked about paper transport maps is that [depending on the scale] you usually get to see the entire area covered.

However, one trend I have noticed with online mapping tools, they often show only one grid of the map at a time, To me, this is not very helpful,

Therefore, I have created a simple HTML file that loads the grid images for the Barcelona bus map, It might not be totally up to date, but it gives a much better understanding than just seeing a small part of the map at a time

Not having a website, and it not being possible to save an HTML file to VirtualTourist, I have included the HTML code below, I don't own the images, the grid images are actually on the mapametrobarcelona.net website...all the HTML file does is display them

Copy and paste the HTML code below into a text file, naming it something like BarcelonaBus.htm (For Notepad users, use "save as type: All Files (*.*), not Text Documents (*.txt)




Barcelona City Bus Map

Barcelona City Bus Map

excellent service comfortable rides, done once,and from friends has been the same so decided to post a tip for all here
the company is Sàgales takes you all over Catalunya and even Madrid, Girona,Zaragoza,and the Prats Barcelona airport.

A nice way to let others drive and see the scenary and the local flavor of its people.

ticket prices is here in Catalan, but self explanatory on the rates in Euros
http://www.sagales.com/ca/bitllets-preus.html
the price from girona to barcelona can be purchase in advance as it has connection with the Ryanair flights there
http://www.sagales.com/sale/index.php?m1=573&m2=568&idioma=1

even a shopping trip to Andorra
http://www.sagales.com/vplus/index.php?idioma=3

some typical inter urban routes on the bus
http://www.sagales.com/index.php?secc=linies&tipus=interurbanes

Bus lines from Barcelona to surrounding areas especially Costa Brava:
www.sarfa.com/paginas/interurbano_buscador.php

FROM: http://forum.virtualtourist.com/Barcelona-274654-7-10045725/Excursion-along-the-coast-east.html

If you are staying in the center, consider to use Aerobus instead of Metro to transfer from and to El Prat Airport. You can avoid to carry your luggage up and down many stairs.
See the website for Aerobus stops and timetables.
Fares in 2012 are 5,65 one way and 9,75 round-trip is within 9 days. Tickets can be purchased on the bus with cash or using the automatic machines with cash or credit cards.

check the website below for up to date information.

The subway is easy t get to places around the city, but then the choice is to walk, or catch a bus. Bus fare is 1,40 Euro each, or a multiple ticket of ten averages ,80 Euro a ride. There is a 75 minute connection availability to get from subway to a bus, or bus to bus. In other words if you transfer within 75 minutes, the transfer is free.

After taking the subway toward Park Guell, the next choice is to walk up the steep streets, find the escalator to get more directly to the top, or take the bus to the stop there. We took the bus; number 24 from Plaza Lesseps stop from the subway. It takes about 20 minutes and around 10 stops to get to the park. The bus was jammed with excess of people while we were there at 11AM. Bus fee is 1,40 Euro, or .80 if buy the multiple tickets of ten.

Regular city bus is the cheapest way to get to the airport! Cheaper than Aerobus, cheaper than train, cheaper than taxi... they depart from both terminals and cost 1,45eur.
You can read the details (different busses and schedules) on: http://hguides.com/barcelona/airport/

On arrival at Barcelona airport, I headed to the Information booth to get a map, some info and my bus touristic tickets. The woman who served me was quite helpful and could speak English .

There are many ways to reach the city, but I found the Aero Bus to be cheap and convenient. I didn’t have to wait for a Bus, they run every 5 minutees. The only catch is you have to load your luggage in the rack yourself, which may be rather hard if you are a woman with heavy luggage.
You can buy your ticket from the staff at the bus stops (payment in cash or by credit card), automatic machines (payment in cash or by credit card), but we paid the Driver of the Bus direct (cash payments only).

It takes about 35 minutes to reach the City from either of the Airport Terminals (T1 or T2).

The ride to the city was fast and in …………
2011 cost 5.30 euro’s one way.
Return tickets are available for…9.15 Euro's and are valid for RETURN up to 9 days after purchasing.

We were dropped off in Rambla de Catalunya, this was very convenient, and for our return trip, it was from the same place.

Most people dont know about it but there is another way to get to barcelona apart from the aerobus,what most tourists would take at the airport. It is true that thats the quickest way to pl.catalunya ,but if you have time you can save some money by taking bus 46 which goes to pl.espana every 20minutes (from there you can easily access everything by metro or other buses) ,or bus N17 at night,which goes to pl.catalunya also every 20minutes. The disadvantage is that these are normal buses,not really designed to fit huge bags,so sometimes you would see bags sliding all over the place :) N17 goes through Prat in the evening which makes the "trip" much longer.

As our hostels were located just in the central place, where mostly all attractions were located (one - between Rambla street and Cathedral square), second one - not so far from Triumphal Arch), we used city bus and metro only few times.

Metro and bus ticket, for a one ride, cost 1,45 euros (for 2010, summer). Metro ticket could be bought at metro line entrance, in purchase boxes. Bus tickets could be bought when entrancing bus. Actually we needed metro for a ride from Catalonia square to Square of Spain (for re-sitting to train to Serra de Montserrat). Bus was used for going from central Catalonia square to Guell park.

For further trips outside the city center and local bus system is rather convenience. As long as you know which bus to take and where to get off it is easy to use and not that much problems with the traffic to gets to its destinations.

We used the bus system several times. Buses are very frequent and it's a nice way to see parts of the city that otherwise I'm not sure we would have seen. There are also night buses, their number starts if the letter "N", a solution to go from one place to another when other buses stop running or when the metro stops running.