Ready for an adventure? Join us for an 9-night tour through Catalonia with 4 nights in Barcelona and attendance at Barcelona Knits!  Barcelona is a feast for the eyes and the imagination. Famous for its modernist architecture with the Sagrada Familia by Gaudi as its iconic symbol, Modernism and Art Nouveau are everywhere you turn in this magical city. Color and fluidity abound as architects here have disdained straight lines and draped their creations with phantasmagorical mosaics and curves reminiscent of fabrics and crazy quilts. We can’t think of a better showcase for a yarn festival - a celebration of color and the drape of our own creative imaginings!  But while we are in Catalonia, we will not confine ourselves to Barcelona… We will venture into the countryside to meet heritage breed sheep and wool producers and dyers working to keep the pastoral traditions alive. We will venture to the edge of our imaginations when we visit the house and collections of Salvador Dali - if Barcelona architecture itself is not surreal, we will discover what is!  And we will learn why Catalonia sets itself apart as an autonomous community of Spain, with a wine tasting and some fantastic Catalan food along the way.  

To Register 

A Registration Form and a non-refundable $1000 deposit are required to join the trip. Once you submit your online registration and deposit payment is received, your spot on the tour is secure. See our Terms & Conditions HERE.

Have questions? Please contact us at info@rowantreetravel.com

This tour has officially been announced a "Go." Unless otherwise stated, our regular Terms and Conditions apply to this trip and for any cancellations (click here to see our Terms and Conditions).

Tour Activity Level 

We would describe this trip as a Woolly Wander.

Mobility Comfort Level = Mobility Level 3+

Cities and Towns in Catalonia are very strict about where buses can stop.  This often leads to walks of 10-20 minutes with luggage to get to pick up points. In order to minimize this, we are using a 19 seater minibus and will be asking participants to bring a carry on size suitcase for our 4 nights outside of Barcelona.  Luggage storage will be arranged in Barcelona for the interim.

Review our Tour Activity and Mobility Comfort Levels here.

Travel Insurance 

Rowan Tree Travel highly recommends purchasing travel insurance. You may purchase through our preferred partner Arch RoamRight by clicking here or through your own provider.

Arranging Your Flights 

In order to gather easily for the tour, we provide an arrival and departure "window" at a major transportation hub - typically an international airport at your destination country. Flights scheduled outside the provided windows may result in additional transportation costs and missed tour activities. For this reason, we greatly appreciate your cooperation in booking travel that accommodates our specifications. Please do not purchase airfare until the tour is guaranteed by RTTF to go forward.

Please Note the Following 

Rowan Tree Travel reserves the right to alter any part of this itinerary in order to address weather conditions, unforeseen circumstances or to improve the participant experience.

BARCELONA

Welcome to Catalonia!  You’ll notice when you arrive at the airport that the signs are written in Spanish, English, and Catalan - but if you happen to know a bit of Spanish, don’t be afraid to use it - hola, por favor and gracias will be well received even though it is not the preferred language of the locals.  Grab a taxi and head to our city center hotel, the H10 Montcada, settle in or explore the neighborhood.  We will gather in the lobby for introductions and a tour orientation at 2:00 pm before heading out for a leisurely lunch and a walk around the neighborhood.  We will be having lots of leisurely lunches on this trip as an early dinner in Spain is any time before 9:00 pm!  

VIC

We will take some time before we leave Barcelona to visit The Design Museum of Barcelona in the morning, where there is an entire floor dedicated to fashion through the ages. We will see traditional costumes from the 1800s as well as fashions up to the present day.  After grabbing a bite to eat at the museum cafe, we will board our bus to explore the Catalonia that exists beyond Barcelona.  Our first visit will be to the Textile Museum of Terrassa to have a tour of more textile treasures through the ages. This will be followed by another leisurely lunch at a delightful local eatery.  From there it is a short drive to our home for the next two nights, Les Clarisses, a boutique hotel in an old convent. 

On Monday, we will spend the day with Elena of Xolla and visit one of the farms where she sources her wool from.  The day will be all about wool, from the growing and gathering of wool from the Ripollesa sheep to the dyeing of the yarn - which we will do ourselves!  Under Elena’s tutelage, we will dye our own yarn for a project we will cast on before we depart Catalonia. 

FIGUERES

Here’s where things turn surreal.  So far, the only surreal aspect of the trip will have been a few buildings that appear to have melted in the Barcelona summer heat.  For the next two days we will visit the galleries and haunts of one of Catalonia’s most famous residents - Salvador Dali.  Though he is most famous for his painting The Persistence of Memory, his work is not all melting watches.  We will visit the Dali Museum in Figueres and have yet another leisurely lunch at an amazing farm to table bistro.  The following day we will visit a Dali residence. Depending on the weather, we will either head to the beautiful coastline of Costa Brava to visit Dali’s main residence, or visit the castle he restored for his beloved wife, Gala.  Either way we will eat fabulous Catalan food and drink the local wine. 

BARCELONA

We will meander our way back to Barcelona on Thursday morning, taking in a few sights along the way that will serve to introduce our favorite modernist architect, Lluís Domènech i Montaner.   When we arrive back at our hotel, our real exploration of Barcelona will begin!  Lunch, followed by a tour of The Palau de Musica, will be the icing on today’s modernist cake. 

Over the next day we will have a tour of La Sagrada Familia, take in the local yarn shops, and indulge in some creative fun at a local maker’s space.  (Hint, it will involve embroidery and architecture!) Laia will show us her favorite haunts to eat, drink and shop and we will take some time to just sit at a tapas bar alongside one of the many squares in the neighborhoods of Barcelona to eat tapas, knit, and watch the world go by.   

Our group will grow a bit in Barcelona as a second RTT group arrives to take in the fun!  Most activities will remain unique to each group, but there will be plenty of company in the hotel to knit with!

BARCELONA

It’s time for Barcelona Knits!  Our hotel is a 20-minute walk from Barcelona’s World Trade Center where the festival takes place, so you can come and go as you please.  Your pass for the weekend is included, and you can choose to either lose yourself completely in yarny goodness or accompany us on optional visits to other architectural highlights and shopping districts of the city.  An evening atop Gaudi’s La Pedrera with Barcelona at our feet will give us a chance to catch up on all we have seen (and purchased) and schmooze with the second group, and our grand finale on Sunday night will be dinner at a local gastro pub.

BARCELONA & ONWARD

We bid you a fond farewell as you make your onward journey today!  

Laia has been knitting and sewing for more than ten years at this point, learning the basics from her mom. She lives with two cats in her native Barcelona where she works as a translator and interpreter. In her spare time she enjoys true crime, vintage fashion, birding and medieval art. Laia spent 11 years living in San Francisco and exploring the American West with her camera in search of neon signs and other roadside weirdness. You can see her photos at @neonsandsigns on Instagram. Whether knitting or sewing, Laia prefers to work from vintage patterns and fabrics, going back as far as the 1890’s.

Colleen is knitting multiple projects right now, spinning hand-blended fibers on her Lendrum DT, and has found it difficult but not impossible to knit and watch a South Korean show on Netflix with subtitles at the same time. She is curious about makers' stories of the lineage and evolution of their craft and where to find truly awesome pie.  Her professional background in outdoor tour guiding and small business ownership makes a great match with RTT. Colleen loves to drive a convertible, swim in natural waters and hula hoops. Does she talk to her plants? That’s what her friends want to know.

Knitwear Designer, Philanthropist, and Motivational Speaker Louis Boria (aka Brooklyn Boy Knits) has been in the Fiber Arts industry for over 17 years.  Since his social media fame, Louis has been at the forefront of breaking down gender norms putting out the message that art has no gender. His commitment to the community continues by bringing fiber artists together with projects such as “Hat Not Hate”, “School of Yarn”, and working with Cancer patients in teaching them how to knit as a form of therapy. Louis’ mission of bringing the fiber arts and purpose together is at the forefront of his work.