Day Trips from Barcelona by Train: 7 Places Worth Leaving For

The Best Day Trips from Barcelona by Train

Barcelona is an exceptional city, but Catalonia is considerably bigger than it looks from Las Ramblas. Within two hours by train, you can be standing inside a monastery on a jagged mountain, wandering through one of Europe's best-preserved medieval old towns, or sipping cava straight from the cellar where it was made. No car hire, no motorway stress: just a platform number and a window seat.

These are the best day trips from Barcelona by train, all genuinely worth the ride and all easier to pull off than most tourists realise.

Montserrat: The Mountain Monastery

This is the day trip from Barcelona that almost everyone does, and almost everyone comes back raving about. Montserrat is a mountain range unlike anything else in Catalonia: jagged pale rock pillars rising dramatically above the surrounding plains, with a working Benedictine monastery wedged improbably into the cliff face. The hike to the Sant Joan hermitage takes about 45 minutes from the upper station and rewards you with the kind of views that make you forget what day it is.

Take the R5 FGC train from Plaça Espanya to Monistrol de Montserrat (around 1 hour), then continue up by rack railway directly to the monastery. Alternatively, change at Montserrat-Aeri for the cable car. Most visitors ride one route up and the other down, and the Montserrat Mountain Card covers both the train from Barcelona and your choice of ascent, plus the museum.

Sitges: The Perfect Beach Day Trip from Barcelona

Sitges is where Barcelonins head on weekend mornings when they want a beach day without the city crowds. For tourists, it is the easiest and most rewarding coastal day trip from Barcelona: 40 minutes on the R2S commuter train from Passeig de Gràcia or Barcelona Sants, and you step out into a whitewashed beach town with 17 beaches, a photogenic old town rising above the promenade, and a pace that immediately makes you forget you were ever in a hurry.

The Cau Ferrat museum, built inside the former home of artist Santiago Rusiñol, is one of the most unusual small museums in Catalonia and well worth an hour. Trains run every 15 to 30 minutes throughout the day and a single ticket costs around €4.60 each way. No booking required: just turn up and go.

Girona: Medieval Streets and a Record-Breaking Cathedral

Girona sits just 38 minutes north of Barcelona on the high-speed AVE train, and it is somehow still overlooked by most tourists. The old town is compact and beautifully preserved: narrow cobblestone streets climbing up to the cathedral, the medieval Jewish quarter known as El Call, and colourful houses leaning over the Onyar river in a row that stops most visitors mid-step.

Girona Cathedral has the widest Gothic nave in the world at nearly 23 metres, wider even than Notre-Dame de Paris. If the name rings a bell from another context, several Game of Thrones scenes were filmed here too. Trains from Barcelona Sants cost between €9 and €20 depending on the service. The regional train takes around 1 hour 40 minutes; the AVE is worth the small extra cost for the time saved.

Figueres: Dalí's Surrealist Theatre-Museum

Figueres is a small town around 1 hour 15 minutes from Barcelona by high-speed train, and the single reason to visit is the Dalí Theatre-Museum. Salvador Dalí designed it himself on the ruins of the municipal theatre where his first public exhibition was held, and he called it the largest surrealist object in the world. He was not wrong. It is strange, funny, disorienting, and completely unlike any other museum in Spain.

Book tickets in advance because the museum sells out frequently in summer. It is closed on Mondays from October to June (open daily in July and August). A smart move is to combine Figueres with Girona in the same day: both towns sit on the same train line, just 25 minutes apart by regional train.

Tarragona: Roman Ruins on the Catalan Coast

Tarragona was once Tarraco, the Roman capital of the Iberian peninsula, and the ruins it left behind are extraordinary. The Roman amphitheatre sits directly on the seafront, which is either mad Roman overconfidence or genius, depending on your perspective. The old town above is pleasant and uncrowded, with a cathedral built on top of a Roman temple and orange-tree-lined streets that see only a fraction of the tourists Girona gets.

The AVE from Barcelona Sants takes around 35 minutes. Regional trains take closer to an hour but cost significantly less. A combined ticket covers the main Roman sites, including the amphitheatre, the forum, the circus, and the city walls. Tarragona also has a small but excellent beach right below the old town, which makes it a rare day trip where you can do history in the morning and sand in the afternoon.

Penedès: Cava Country, 40 Minutes from Barcelona

Most tourists do not realise this is possible as a day trip from Barcelona by train, which is exactly why it is worth doing. The Penedès wine region produces almost all of Spain's cava, and the town of Sant Sadurní d'Anoia sits on the regional train line from Barcelona Sants, just 40 to 50 minutes away. The Freixenet cellar is right next to the station, less than 5 minutes on foot.

You can do this entirely on your own. A regional train ticket costs around €4.50 each way. Walk to the winery, book a cellar tour and tasting on arrival, and be back in Barcelona before dark. The nearby town of Vilafranca del Penedès is another stop on the same line if you want to explore the wider Catalan wine region.

Frequently Asked Questions