Gay Spots, Barcelona

Barcelona is certainly a place for a walk on the wild side. The city rival any other, when it comes to nightlife in any form. Terje and I wanted to have a walk to explore gay life, and we seriously fell in love with People Lounge and the two charming men in charge of the bar - Martin, originally from Caracas, and Antonio from Genova.

We spotted two nice men walking in direction C. Casanova, where we knew we would find some bars, and we just followed them to People Lounge.

This is a seriously nice bar, great interior, nice crowd, slightly eccentric music and above all - good company. Easy to get in touch with people. In fact, we loved the People Lounge so much, that we came back - three evenings in a row!! So this is certainly a place for you to discover, if you would like to have a walk on the gay side of town. Beware - good company give you serious hangovers. We had large glasses of wine and the occasional drink, and the liquor was not measured in thimbles, but was pured in generous quantities into our glasses. So we certainly needed to an ibuprofen or two the next morning to clear up and take a da capo the next evening.

Dress Code: Informal

Following on from my tips on the bars l have two tips on nightclubs.

First is Arena Madre, Balmes 32. We found from going there and talking to local guys this is a younger hang out. The club is actually pretty good, witha good sizes dance floor with techno/House music. If you pay entry for one Arena club you cna gain entry to the other Arena clubs (beware the other Arena clubs are more mixed and not exclusively gay).

Secondly is of course Salvation, Ronda San Pere 19-21 (you will see the crowds outside). Only open Friday or Saturday night and free to get into before 1.30am. Salvation has two dance floors, one techno/house and the other 90's and camp classics (check the website for better information). I loved it, we clubbed till it closed at 6am and met some nice guys. it was agood mix of older gay guys and young gay boys all just having good fun. However drinks after 1.30am are €8 for anything behind the bar.

*Both clubs have dark rooms but the clubs themselves are not agressively cruisy places*

Dress Code: Look sexy! hahaaaaa

The Spanish do start drinking and partying later in the evening than us British, but we did come across a couple of gay pre-club bars in the L'Eixample district within close walking distance to each other leading down to the Arena clubs and Universitat area.

All these bars are busy on a Friday or Saturday night so you could headout abit earlier (11pm).

*Sassy (in the gay guides they call it Crazy's)- Concell de Cent, 245.Bar/Disco Attracts young guys (18-30) and really good fun- also has drag queen shows.

*Dietrich- Concell de Cent, 255. Cool bar, with a crowd generally 25-40 years old

*Zeltas- Casanova, 75. Again a cool place for the more sophisticated gay guy, l think this a place in Barcelona to be seen?

On a week night no bar is too busy and most don't get busy or even open until 12am.

Dress Code: No dress code, just look sexy!