Hello, dear travel lovers. We arrived in Badalona during the first week of November. It’s a suburb near Barcelona. As soon as we arrived, we started exploring. In the evening, we went to the circus. We began our tour with a walk along the beach.
Badalona really has a beautiful promenade, lined with many palm trees, where parrots live. They fly joyfully, squawk, scream, drop the palm fruits, eat them and make a mess. The benches and surroundings are full of palm fruits and their remnants.
I love watching parrots. They say some things you can watch forever. I would add parrots eating palm fruits to that list.
Badalona is a large city and as we ventured a bit deeper, we came across a charming café called Capibara. There’s a white capybara on the wall holding a small pastry. This café mostly serves sweets and you can have a coffee and some biscuits. The cakes are around 3.50 each though prices vary. Then we continued walking along another street, which was pedestrian-only and very pleasant.
Here there's a place called Frankfurt, but it’s not a city. Just a hot dog stand. So when you see Frankfurt in Spain, don’t think of the city, it’s just a type of hotdog.
There were still Halloween decorations here, with a few pumpkins around, but everything was mixed up since Halloween was over and Christmas decorations were starting to go up. The Christmas lights weren’t on yet, but everything was ready. There are many shops on the street, such as a cosmetics store called Kika. We kept walking and stumbled upon a bakery where everything looked so appetizing.
This is a very lively street, almost as if all of Badalona’s residents are walking here. There was almost no one on the beach road, but when we turned onto this street, there was a big crowd. There are many shops here, selling cheeses, sweets and other items.
We left the busiest street in Badalona and started walking through a regular neighborhood. I gathered such lovely impressions of Badalona, especially the first part along the center and the beach. I even told my friend "Let’s live in Badalona". My friend was a bit surprised and replied "We shouldn’t get too emotional about things" and changed the subject. He always does that. 😊
Then we started wandering through the darker streets of Badalona.
The park and metro system in this area is very convenient. Barcelona’s city metro extends all the way to Badalona, which is very useful. The transportation network is well-developed and you can easily travel anywhere in Barcelona by metro. There are also NFI trains and municipal buses here. The city has a flat structure, which is important because, after walking up steep hills for several days in El Masnou, we realized that living in a flat city is wonderful because you don’t have to keep climbing up and down.
We reached the metro entrance. Turning left from here, you can reach the sea and from there, take a train to other places. The buses come one after the other. There’s a different atmosphere here, with roads for vehicles and wide sidewalks for pedestrians. We can walk comfortably without getting crowded.
Now I’d like to mention an interesting topic. There’s something that particularly caught my attention in Badalona and Barcelona: large construction garbage bags. If someone is renovating their home, the question immediately arises. "Where do we throw these big bags?" People buy these giant garbage bags from stores that sell construction materials. After the renovation, all the waste goes into these bags and they call a special vehicle to pick them up. The price of these garbage bags is around 50 Euros and they can hold about one cubic meter of waste. They are generally used for construction debris or soil. It’s hard to find a place to dispose of such waste on your own. Usually either large bags or construction containers are rented.
We continued on our way. Actually we came to Badalona not just to explore, but to go to the circus.Last year, we visited the Circo Historico Raluy in Barcelona and really enjoyed it. Now I was excited to go to this year’s show. My popcorn was ready, I had wine in my bag and we were all set for a great evening.
We found Circo Raluy.This circus tours different cities and when we went, it was in Badalona. That night, they were just starting their performances there. They’ll be in Badalona until December, so those interested can go. We paid 66 Euros for two tickets and sat in the front row. Tickets can be purchased at the box office or through their website and there are some discounts available on certain days.
It was an amazing show and we really loved it. This year’s program was completely different from last year. There’s a new clown, very energetic and fun. We had loved the clown from last year and now we were in love with the new one. The show is still performed by the same family, but half of the performers have changed, so the acts are completely new.
I definitely recommend it to everyone. Go to this circus, no matter what city you’re in. This year, there will be shows in Girona and San Hugo as well. Last year, it was very hard to get tickets in Barcelona, but here there were still seats available. If you live in Badalona or Barcelona, you definitely shouldn’t miss this circus. You can also get extra discounts if you buy tickets through the website. The program was so fun, we really enjoyed it.
It looks like this circus will be back every year and we plan to go every year because we had so much fun. I’ll quickly say goodbye to you here and I hope to see you in new adventures.