On our recent trip to Barcelona, a Trip Advisor contributor recommended going to Park Guell from top to bottom as opposed from the bottom to the top. We drove past Park Guell on the hop-on, hop-off tour bus and the steep uphill walk looked like pure misery. I could totally see myself complaining the entire time if I went that way. I'm a fast-pass type of person. I want the fastest, easiest, quickest route to everything. I hate waiting in lines or paying for tickets. I want V.I.P. all day, every day. We went to Park Guell from the top on October 21st, 2013. I hear that Park Guell will start charging entrance fees soon, so this "Park Guell Fast-Pass" or "Park Guell from Top to Bottom" method may not work for much longer. If it changes, please let me know in the comments.
After intensive internet searching, I finally found some directions to go from the top of Park Guell to the bottom. I decided to correct and expand upon the directions I found. I must say that it was really a really enjoyable walk and no complaining occurred on my part, except for when the bathrooms near the middle section's food court ran out of toilet paper. :D Using the L5 train station at Ell Coll / La Teixonera will do almost all of the incline that you would have had to manually traverse had you taken the bus that drops you off at the front entrance of Park Guell. This method will take you by some of the best and cheapest views of Barcelona through sleepy neighborhoods filled with elderly and young children.
Check out the detailed map from the L5 train station at Ell Coll / La Teixonera to Park Guell.
10 STEPS TO PARK GUELL
1.) Take the L5 Metro subway train (towards Vall D'Hebron) to Ell Coll / La Teixonera station.
Please note that signs for the Ell Coll La Teixonera train station is sometimes displayed with or without a "/" and sometimes with a "|".
2.) Get off the L5 train at Ell Coll La Teixonera stop.
3.) EXIT THE TRAIN STATION
Exiting the train station isn't difficult (and pretty intuitive), but there are a lot of directions involved. When in doubt, just go with your gut.
A.) TAKE ESCALATOR from the subway platform.
Some people have suggested taking the elevators here,
however the wait is long and not worth the wait
B.) NEXT TAKE WALKALATOR (horizontal escalator).
There are at least 2 walkalators, one right after the other.
C.) At end of walkaltor, go to the right and follow the exit for Mare de Deu del Coll.
D.) THEN TAKE ELEVATOR.
E.) GET OFF ELEVATOR
and you will see artificial day-time lights by elevators.
E.) GO THROUGH TURNSTYLES
that are opposite the artificial lights by the elevators.
The "exit" turnstyles are just to the right of this picture.
E.) FOLLOW EXIT FOR BEAT ALMATO
It is named "Sortida Beat Almato".
F.) TAKE THE WALKALATOR TOWARDS THE BRIGHT LIGHT
G.) YOU SOON REALIZE THAT THE BRIGHT LIGHT IS THE OUTSIDE AND YOU EXIT.
4.) ONCE OUTSIDE, TAKE ALMOST 180° TURN TO LEFT AND TAKE 2 ESCALATORS UP THE HILLSIDE.
5.) At top of elevators and at street, turn right onto Santuari.
6.) Santuari will end at a "T" intersection. A church / school sits on the corner of the intersection on the right side.
Church / School Bells:
Turn right at end of this building on right (which is a school / church).
7.) Turn right onto Carrer Ceuta at the corner of the 3-way T-Intersection
8.) Just after the church / school building ends, Ceuta street splits into 3 streets.
The left one goes up hill.
The middle one has a slight incline.
The right street goes downward.
It's your lucky day, cross the street to go to the middle street.
Cross the intersection to the middle street, you'll see a bricked plaza with park benches that has a beautiful view. We stopped here to take pictures and refill our our water bottles.
Most of the remaining walk is on the mountainside is flat with a curvy mountain-side road with fantastic views (similar to a Hollywood Hills street)
Hubs refilling our water bottles.
9.) CONTINUE ON ROAD TO PARK GUELL
There will be times where you will second guess if you're on the right path, but as long as you chose the middle street with the bricked plaza, you'll be golden.
Portions of the street have no sidewalk.
This road will empty directly into the top of Park Guell.
Some portions of the street have "sidewalks".
Great views from this street.
There are places to stop, take a load off, and take in the view from bench chairs.
10.) WHEN YOU SEE WOODED AREA ON STREET A HEAD OF YOU, YOU ARE AT PARK GUELL.
The trees on the right side of picture below is Park Guell. At the top of the hill, where the white Mercedes sits is a breathtaking view of Barcelona from the highest point at Park Guell. You can get to the main portion of Park Guell if you go straight up the hill or turn right at the 3-way intersection right in front of the Mercedes SUV.
Once you climb the little steep hill (where the white Mercedes is parked), you'll see a group of people (most of who climbed Park Guell from bottom-to-top) enjoying the view.
The view from the top of Park Guell.
As you face Barcelona and the sea, if you turn to your right, you just can go towards the direction where all of the people are coming from - salmon-style.
Entrance to the peak of Park Guell.
I was apprehensive about getting lost in Park Guell, bc the internet made it seem massive. It may be massive for European standards, but not for this mid-western girl. I was thinking I would get lost, stranded, and have to send smoke signals for help because my American CDMA device doesn't work in Europe. That wasn't the case, in the least bit. There are well treaded paths and the woods aren't so dense that you feel isolated. Just follow the park's zig-zag path down the hill, and if you're impatient like me and want to fast-pass from the top to the bottom, there are straight-line shortcuts through the zig-zags that allow you to by-pass the scenic route. Once at the the park, there wasn't a time where we were by ourselves, because Park Guell is crawling with tourists and vendors. Hope you enjoy the fast pass Park Guell from Top to Bottom as much as we did!
PS - Are you wondering how to get out of there? From the Park Guell entrance, go right on Carrer d'Olot and then your immediate next left. Walk downhill on the right side of street until you see a bus sign for #116 (towards Av del coll del Portell- Baixada de la Gloria). We skipped the first bus stop for #116 we saw and went to the next one because we were afraid that the bus woudn't be stopping there due to construction on the street. The next stop was about a block and a half downhill. When the small bus came, it did not say it was going in the direction we were looking for. We asked the bus driver if he was going to Lesseps and he was. We took the bus 5 or 6 stops to exit at Place Lesseps. Place Lesseps looks like a little plaza area. We walked to the Lesseps metro station uphill from where we were dropped off by the bus. Take the L3 train to wherever you want to go from the Lesseps metro station.
After intensive internet searching, I finally found some directions to go from the top of Park Guell to the bottom. I decided to correct and expand upon the directions I found. I must say that it was really a really enjoyable walk and no complaining occurred on my part, except for when the bathrooms near the middle section's food court ran out of toilet paper. :D Using the L5 train station at Ell Coll / La Teixonera will do almost all of the incline that you would have had to manually traverse had you taken the bus that drops you off at the front entrance of Park Guell. This method will take you by some of the best and cheapest views of Barcelona through sleepy neighborhoods filled with elderly and young children.
Check out the detailed map from the L5 train station at Ell Coll / La Teixonera to Park Guell.
10 STEPS TO PARK GUELL
1.) Take the L5 Metro subway train (towards Vall D'Hebron) to Ell Coll / La Teixonera station.
Please note that signs for the Ell Coll La Teixonera train station is sometimes displayed with or without a "/" and sometimes with a "|".
2.) Get off the L5 train at Ell Coll La Teixonera stop.
3.) EXIT THE TRAIN STATION
Exiting the train station isn't difficult (and pretty intuitive), but there are a lot of directions involved. When in doubt, just go with your gut.
A.) TAKE ESCALATOR from the subway platform.
Some people have suggested taking the elevators here,
however the wait is long and not worth the wait
B.) NEXT TAKE WALKALATOR (horizontal escalator).
There are at least 2 walkalators, one right after the other.
C.) At end of walkaltor, go to the right and follow the exit for Mare de Deu del Coll.
D.) THEN TAKE ELEVATOR.
E.) GET OFF ELEVATOR
and you will see artificial day-time lights by elevators.
E.) GO THROUGH TURNSTYLES
that are opposite the artificial lights by the elevators.
The "exit" turnstyles are just to the right of this picture.
E.) FOLLOW EXIT FOR BEAT ALMATO
It is named "Sortida Beat Almato".
F.) TAKE THE WALKALATOR TOWARDS THE BRIGHT LIGHT
G.) YOU SOON REALIZE THAT THE BRIGHT LIGHT IS THE OUTSIDE AND YOU EXIT.
4.) ONCE OUTSIDE, TAKE ALMOST 180° TURN TO LEFT AND TAKE 2 ESCALATORS UP THE HILLSIDE.
5.) At top of elevators and at street, turn right onto Santuari.
6.) Santuari will end at a "T" intersection. A church / school sits on the corner of the intersection on the right side.
Church / School Bells:
Turn right at end of this building on right (which is a school / church).
7.) Turn right onto Carrer Ceuta at the corner of the 3-way T-Intersection
8.) Just after the church / school building ends, Ceuta street splits into 3 streets.
The left one goes up hill.
The middle one has a slight incline.
The right street goes downward.
It's your lucky day, cross the street to go to the middle street.
Cross the intersection to the middle street, you'll see a bricked plaza with park benches that has a beautiful view. We stopped here to take pictures and refill our our water bottles.
Most of the remaining walk is on the mountainside is flat with a curvy mountain-side road with fantastic views (similar to a Hollywood Hills street)
Hubs refilling our water bottles.
View from Park of 3-way intersection
9.) CONTINUE ON ROAD TO PARK GUELL
There will be times where you will second guess if you're on the right path, but as long as you chose the middle street with the bricked plaza, you'll be golden.
Portions of the street have no sidewalk.
This road will empty directly into the top of Park Guell.
Some portions of the street have "sidewalks".
Great views from this street.
10.) WHEN YOU SEE WOODED AREA ON STREET A HEAD OF YOU, YOU ARE AT PARK GUELL.
The trees on the right side of picture below is Park Guell. At the top of the hill, where the white Mercedes sits is a breathtaking view of Barcelona from the highest point at Park Guell. You can get to the main portion of Park Guell if you go straight up the hill or turn right at the 3-way intersection right in front of the Mercedes SUV.
Once you climb the little steep hill (where the white Mercedes is parked), you'll see a group of people (most of who climbed Park Guell from bottom-to-top) enjoying the view.
The view from the top of Park Guell.
As you face Barcelona and the sea, if you turn to your right, you just can go towards the direction where all of the people are coming from - salmon-style.
Entrance to the peak of Park Guell.
I was apprehensive about getting lost in Park Guell, bc the internet made it seem massive. It may be massive for European standards, but not for this mid-western girl. I was thinking I would get lost, stranded, and have to send smoke signals for help because my American CDMA device doesn't work in Europe. That wasn't the case, in the least bit. There are well treaded paths and the woods aren't so dense that you feel isolated. Just follow the park's zig-zag path down the hill, and if you're impatient like me and want to fast-pass from the top to the bottom, there are straight-line shortcuts through the zig-zags that allow you to by-pass the scenic route. Once at the the park, there wasn't a time where we were by ourselves, because Park Guell is crawling with tourists and vendors. Hope you enjoy the fast pass Park Guell from Top to Bottom as much as we did!
PS - Are you wondering how to get out of there? From the Park Guell entrance, go right on Carrer d'Olot and then your immediate next left. Walk downhill on the right side of street until you see a bus sign for #116 (towards Av del coll del Portell- Baixada de la Gloria). We skipped the first bus stop for #116 we saw and went to the next one because we were afraid that the bus woudn't be stopping there due to construction on the street. The next stop was about a block and a half downhill. When the small bus came, it did not say it was going in the direction we were looking for. We asked the bus driver if he was going to Lesseps and he was. We took the bus 5 or 6 stops to exit at Place Lesseps. Place Lesseps looks like a little plaza area. We walked to the Lesseps metro station uphill from where we were dropped off by the bus. Take the L3 train to wherever you want to go from the Lesseps metro station.
