Barcelona City tour or Barcelona Bus Turistic

[fcleiser3]

In Barcelona, which HOHO bus is better Barcelona City Tours (red buses) or Barcelona Bus Turistic (white and blue buses) ????

[chipmaster]

IMHO a cab and the subway to a few key attractions is a better deal if time is short and you actually want to get close to things versus seing from a bus.

[auburngirlie]

I had the same question! Found on another thread where most people were recommending the red line. Would love to hear what others think....

[Ashland]

I prefer (as I have written on these boards) the red bus Barcelona City Tours...it is privately owned and is much less crowded..You won't be sorry as this gives you a great overview of Barcelona...We spent an entire day HO & HO...:D

[Guttedsnowbird]

I have read some threads on the HoHo but but still don't understand a couple of practical matters:

1. How does one get from the port to these buses? We will only be in town the day the ship is there

2. How and where does one buy a ticket? I have read that online sales are to be avoided?

[Laika Sproed]

Two links for the options discussed are:

http://www.barcelonacitytour.cat/en/ City Bus Tour Hop on Hop off

or

http://www.barcelonabusturistic.cat/web/guest Turistic Bus Tour Hop on Hop Off

[RollieUK]

In Barcelona, which HOHO bus is better Barcelona City Tours (red buses) or Barcelona Bus Turistic (white and blue buses) ????

 

See this thread which also refers back to this one

[LolaGlobetrotter]

In Barcelona, which HOHO bus is better Barcelona City Tours (red buses) or Barcelona Bus Turistic (white and blue buses) ????

 

I took the Bus Turistic (which is the most popular and has actually 3 lines: blue and red are the main routes and the green one is a shorter version). All important sights are included in the routes and you can easily take the busses every 5-15min.

Here you can find a little comparison of the HOHO buses in Barcelona and you can also book it online (why this should be avoided?) I personally had no issues, I printed my voucher and everything was fine

[ldydoc12]

I was very disappointed with the red Barcelona city bus. You had to take the port bus to get outside the port where you can pick up either bus. We went with the Barcelona City Bus as most people said there were less people on it which may be true. The problem to get to the sites we wanted to see it took over an hour to transfer to the other line and then another hour to get to the cathedral. I felt I spent too much time on a bus and not enjoying the city. I agree with using cabs and public transportation if there are a couple of must see sights. Barcelona was our big disappointment.

[mskaufman]

When we were there we used the Bus Turistic. I have read the pluses and minuses of both on this board. I can tell you that we were happy with the bus and the service and believe that we were able to get to more places than if we used metro and a cab. There are places that we got off for 15 minutes to walk around that we would have never taken a cab to.

 

In selecting which bus to use my recommendation would be to prioritize the list of places you want to stop and see which bus gets you to those places more efficiently. Then, you can take your time and go to the places that are secondary on your list. We chose Bus Turistic because La Sagrada and Parc Guell were early stops from our starting point at Placa Catalunya. After Parc Guell we go to rest on the bus on the way to Montjuic.