Montjuïc on Foot: Palaces, Gardens and the Castle in Half a Day

Montjuïc is the hill that Barcelona keeps building on when it wants to impress. In 1929 the city held a world's fair here, and in 1992 it staged the Olympic Games on the same slopes. What those two events left behind is a trail of palaces, a pretend Spanish village, gardens and a fortress, all joined by paths that mostly climb gently.

This walk starts at the bottom, by the fountain, and finishes at the castle on top. Bring water, wear shoes you can walk uphill in, and leave the morning free: the hill rewards a slow pace.

Start at the Magic Fountain of Montjuïc, the lowest point of the old fairground. The engineer Carles Buïgas designed it, and its first show was on 19 May 1929, the day before the exhibition opened. The Civil War damaged it badly, and it did not run again until 1955. By day it is a set of basins and jets; the colour and music happen on selected evenings, so check the city's calendar if you want to see it perform. Stand at the bottom of the avenue and look uphill: the whole walk is laid out in front of you, with the big domed palace at the top of the steps.

The Palau Nacional was the main building of the 1929 fair. Its first stone was laid in 1926, and it was meant to be temporary, yet it has housed the National Art Museum of Catalonia since 1934. Look at the central oval dome and the Renaissance-style front, then turn round on the steps: from here the avenue, the fountain and the city fall away beneath you. Go inside for the art, and for the two viewpoint terraces on the roof that reopened in 2023. The museum says visitors with reduced mobility cannot complete the terrace tour.

A short walk west of the palace, the Poble Espanyol is a small town of 117 buildings, each a full-size copy of a place somewhere in Spain. Built for the 1929 fair by architects Francesc Folguera and Ramon Reventós, it was designed to be a tour of the country in an afternoon. Walk the streets rather than rush: many of the houses now hold craft workshops where you can watch glass being blown or pottery made, and there is a small museum of modern art too. It is a place to wander, have a coffee in a square and compare the regions.

Leave the village and climb south-east towards the Olympic area. The white spire you have been glimpsing over the rooftops is the Torre de Comunicacions de Montjuïc, designed by Santiago Calatrava and built between 1989 and 1992 to carry the broadcasts of the Olympic Games. It stands 136 metres high and is meant to read as an athlete holding up the Olympic flame. Walk round the base and look at the broken-tile mosaic, a technique usually linked with Gaudí, which Calatrava borrowed for the foot of the tower. Treat this as a look-and-photograph stop from outside.

Now the walk becomes a garden stroll. The Parc de Montjuïc covers much of the hill, and parts of it were cleared from the old forest in the 1890s to make parkland. Gardens such as the botanical garden and the Mossèn Costa i Llobera gardens are tucked into its slopes, so you can swap the paved route for a shaded path whenever you want. The park is for going slowly: sit on a bench, follow a path round a bend, and let the sea come into view between the trees. There is no single sight to find here, and that is the point after the show-piece buildings below.

End at the top, at Montjuïc Castle. A fort was first built here in 1640, during the Catalan revolt, and the British captured it in 1705. The present fortress replaced the old one from 1751, with major works between 1779 and 1799 that gave it its final form and 120 cannons. It also has a darker later history: Lluís Companys, the Catalan president, was executed here in 1940. Barcelona's city council took the castle over in 2007. Walk the outer ramparts for the best views over the harbour and the city, and read the signs on the way.

You have climbed from a fairground fountain to a fortress, and between them walked through two eras, the 1929 fair and the 1992 Games, each of which reshaped the hill. To go down, the funicular and the cable car both reach the castle area, and the slopes below it are pleasant on foot. Whichever way you choose, the long view across the harbour will be behind you.