Free Walking Tour Girona: Rambla to Eiffel Bridge

Your Girona Walking Tour, From the Rambla to the River

1. 1

   Rambla de la Llibertat

   

   You begin on Girona's favourite promenade, running alongside the Onyar from close to the Pont de Pedra. Look at the east side first: the houses stand on public arcades at street level, some medieval, some neoclassical. Several façades still keep dressed stone and Gothic windows. At number 36, Can Casadevall, you can pick out a 14th-century window in florid Gothic style and a second one from the 15th century.

   The name comes from a Liberty Tree planted here in 1869, during the democratic interlude Catalans call the Sexenni Democràtic. Long before that, this was the Plaça de les Cols, Girona's great market. People came from up to about 25 km away, from the Empordà and the Selva, and the fair of Sant Narcís drew visitors from all over Catalonia. On the river side, shops sold spices, sweets, wax and medicines.

   The street took shape as an extension of the Argenteria. A narrow lane with arcades, the Voltes dels Esparters, once led on towards the bridge; it was probably built in the 14th century and torn down in 1875. In 1882 the first arcaded house got its neoclassical front and porches, part of a plan to renew all the medieval arcades that was never finished, which is why you still see both styles side by side.

   Locals still treat the Rambla as their meeting place: on Saturdays flower stalls go up, and a vermouth at one of the cafés is a fixed ritual. From here it is 410 m, about 6 min, uphill into the old town to the Basilica de Sant Feliu.

   Hours

   Open 24/7 (free main street)

   Price

   Free

   Location

   Rambla de la Llibertat on Google Maps ↗

2. 2

   Basilica de Sant Feliu

   

   Before Girona had a cathedral, this was its main church, which is why its parish is still called the Parròquia Major. Its Gothic bell tower is one of the shapes that define the city's skyline, so take a moment outside to look up. The church sits on a rise of the hill where most of Roman Girona once spread out.

   It is documented from 882, but building went on from the 12th until the 17th century, and you can read that in the stone: a Romanesque core, Gothic naves and roofs, and a Baroque façade. The Gothic rebuilding that shapes most of what you see was agreed by the chapter in 1313.

   The reason to go in is in the presbytery. Eight Roman and early Christian sarcophagi from the 3rd and 4th centuries are set into its walls; tradition says they were found right here, because the church rose over an ancient cemetery. Look also for the alabaster tomb of Sant Narcís, carved by Joan de Tournai between 1326 and 1328.

   The saint behind the name is Felix, martyred in Girona during the persecution under Diocletian. Around the early 4th century the poet Prudentius praised the city in Latin as "little Gerunda, rich in holy relics", and devotion to Felix spread across Iberia and southern Gaul.

   Entry is paid and the ticket stays valid for 48 hours. Worth it if early Christian sculpture or Gothic tombs interest you. The Arab Baths are just 160 m away, 3 min on foot.

   Local name

   Església de Sant Feliu de Girona

   Hours

   Mon–Sat 10:00–18:00, Sun 13:00–18:00; no visits during services; closed on Christmas Day, New Year's Day, Epiphany and Easter Sunday

   Price

   12 EUR (one ticket for all spaces of the visit, usable within 48 hours); ages 16–24, over 65 and pensioners 8 EUR; ages 8–16 and visitors with disabilities 1.50 EUR

   Website

   catedraldegirona.cat ↗

   Location

   Basilica de Sant Feliu on Google Maps ↗

3. 3

   Arab Baths

   

   The name misleads: these baths were built for Girona's Christian residents and are Romanesque. The present building dates from 1294, replacing an earlier bathhouse from the late 12th century, first recorded in 1194. In 1931 they were declared a protected monument.

   The first room is the one everyone remembers. In the changing room, a small octagonal pool sits in the centre, ringed by slender columns that carry a lantern dome of volcanic stone with openings to the sky. Look closely at the capitals: they show plants and animals, allegories of the Garden of Eden and creatures from Christian symbolism.

   Then you follow the old bathing sequence. The cold room came first, for cool foot baths or cold showers, sealed by double swing doors to keep it cool. Next was the warm room, where bathers warmed up again, and last the hot room, a steam bath that could pass 50 degrees. The heat came from an underground furnace, the hypocaust, through a wall shaft and an underfloor system, which also boiled water into steam. It likely filled the room with smoke too.

   This is a short, cheap visit that works for almost everyone, children included. Sant Pere de Galligants is only 120 m on, a 2 min walk.

   Local name

   Banys àrabs de Girona

   Hours

   Mon–Sat: 10:00–18:00 | Sun: 10:00–14:00

   Price

   3 EUR adults, 2 EUR seniors (65+), 1 EUR students/groups of 15+/unemployed/large families, under 8 free

   Website

   banysarabs.cat ↗

   Location

   Arab Baths on Google Maps ↗

4. 4

   Monastery Sant Pere de Galligants

   

   This Benedictine abbey takes its name from the Galligants stream that runs past it. It was founded in 992 outside the city walls, when Count Ramon Borrell of Barcelona gave the monks rights over the quarter of Sant Pere. They ruled it until 1339, when King Peter IV of Aragon took it back for the Crown.

   In 1117 the monastery was joined to Lagrasse Abbey in Northern Catalonia, today in France, yet it kept its own abbot and much of its independence. It was never a large community, and its church was not the parish church: only baptisms were held here. In 1362 the new walls enclosed it, and it was reshaped for defence. Decline set in from the 15th century, and by 1835 just an abbot and four monks remained.

   Outside, look at the archaic portal, probably reused from an older building, and the rose window above it, 3.5 m across. The church of 1130 has a nave, two aisles, a transept and four apses; the apse capitals are richer and may be by several hands, some attributed to the Master of Cabestany.

   The small cloister is the highlight: its north gallery dates from 1154, the others from 1190, with capitals showing scenes from the life of Jesus, lions and medieval sirens. Since 1857 the building has housed the Archaeology Museum of Catalonia's Girona venue, which charges entry. Then walk 260 m, 5 min, along the Passeig Arqueològic up to the Passeig de la Muralla.

   Hours

   Mon: Closed | Tue–Sat: 10:00–18:00 | Sun: 10:00–14:00

   Price

   4.50 EUR adults, 3 EUR students/seniors, free under 16

   Website

   macgirona.cat ↗

   Location

   Monastery Sant Pere de Galligants on Google Maps ↗

5. 5

   Passeig de la Muralla

   

   Up here you walk on the city's defences: walls, towers, gates and bastions that still ring the historic core and are protected as a national cultural asset. Sections can be walked, and walking them is free.

   The story starts with Rome. Between 80 and 70 BC the general Pompey founded Gerunda from scratch during the Sertorian wars, to control the road to the empire, the Via Heraclea, later called the Via Augusta. The first wall followed the terrain and formed a triangle of about 6 hectares, built of sandstone from Domeny, perhaps partly over Iberian walls. Its main north south street was today's Carrer de la Força.

   The highest point of that triangle was the square bastion of Torre Gironella, the only tower of the whole wall, needed because the surrounding mountains rise higher than the town. From there the line ran down to the Correu Vell gate at the start of Carrer de la Força, the southern entrance. Much of the original course can still be traced, though the Roman remains often survive only in the foundations of later walls.

   Take your time here: the walls are the thread that ties the whole old town together. From your section, the cathedral is 250 m away, about 4 min on foot.

   Hours

   September–May 8:00–21:00, June–August 8:00–23:00 (gate hours)

   Price

   Free

   Website

   girona.cat ↗

   Location

   Passeig de la Muralla on Google Maps ↗

6. 6

   Girona Cathedral

   

   The Cathedral of Saint Mary is the reason many people come to Girona, and the reason is inside. Its single Gothic nave is 22.98 m wide, the widest Gothic nave in the world and second only to St. Peter's in Rome among all churches. For scale, the nave of Notre Dame in Paris is 12 m wide. The vault rises 35 m.

   Outside you see the Baroque main façade, begun in 1606 but only completed at the top in 1961; local sculptors carved its figures in the 1960s. Walk around to find the Gothic portal of St. Michael on the north side and the 14th-century Apostles' portico on the south, whose twelve figures by Antoni Claperós from the 1460s are mostly lost.

   The site is much older. A Christian church stood here before 717, when it became a mosque; Charlemagne's Franks took the city in 785 and the church was reconsecrated in 908. In 1015 Bishop Peter Roger restored it, paying with money from selling the church of St. Daniel to his brother-in-law, Count Ramon Borrell. Of that Romanesque building only the 12th-century cloister and a bell tower, finished in 1117, survive.

   The great nave came from a bold decision: after Pere Sacoma's redesign of 1312 and years of hesitation, Guillem Bofill and Antoni Canet began the single wide nave in 1416. Go in, stand in the middle and look up. Entry is paid and the ticket lasts 48 hours. Then 290 m, 5 min, past the Girona Art Museum to the Jewish quarter.

   Hours

   Mon–Sat 10:00–18:00, Sun 12:00–18:00; summer (15 June – 15 September) Mon–Fri 10:00–19:00, Sat and eves of holidays 10:00–20:00, Sun 12:00–19:00; no visits to the nave during services; closed on Christmas Day, New Year's Day, Epiphany and Easter Sunday

   Price

   12 EUR (one ticket for all spaces of the visit, usable within 48 hours); ages 16–24, over 65 and pensioners 8 EUR; ages 8–16 and visitors with disabilities 1.50 EUR

   Website

   catedraldegirona.cat ↗

   Location

   Girona Cathedral on Google Maps ↗

7. 7

   Museum of Jewish History

   

   You are now in the heart of the Call, Girona's medieval Jewish quarter. The museum occupies the Bonastruc ça Porta centre, in the former Casal Ferrer, on the very spot where the quarter's last synagogue and its buildings stood in the 15th century.

   After the Alhambra Decree ordered the expulsion of the Jews in 1492, the building was sold and passed through private hands until the 1980s. Then the local cultural activist Josep Tarrés pushed for the recovery of the Call from the Isaac el Cec centre, which used these same rooms. In 1992 the city, the province and the Catalan government created the Patronat del Call to run it all.

   The museum's rooms opened in July 2000, and in December 2012 a space for temporary exhibitions followed. Between 2012 and 2015, parts of the old synagogue were recovered, including the ritual bath, the mikveh, which for many visitors is the most moving moment of the visit. The building also hosts the Nahmanides Institute for research on Jewish Girona and the offices of Spain's network of Jewish quarters.

   Go in if you want to understand what Catalonia's Jewish communities gave to its culture and science, and what was lost. There is an entry fee. From here it is 240 m, 3 min, down to the river with its colourful houses and the Eiffel Bridge.

   Local name

   Museu d'Història dels Jueus

   Hours

   July/August: Mon–Sat 10:00–20:00, Sun/holidays 10:00–14:00. September–June: Tue–Sat 10:00–18:00, Mon/Sun/holidays 10:00–14:00. Last admission 30 min before closing.

   Price

   4 EUR regular, 2 EUR reduced, under 14 free

   Website

   girona.cat ↗

   Location

   Museum of Jewish History on Google Maps ↗

8. 8

   Eiffel Bridge

   

   You finish on a red iron footbridge over the Onyar, known in Catalan as the Pont de les Peixateries Velles. It is a lattice of riveted iron 3.5 m deep, spanning the river in a single 41.5 m leap, about 7 m above the riverbed. The deck is only 2.62 m wide and laid with wooden planks, chosen so rust would not attack the iron.

   Its story begins with a public auction on 6 January 1877. Two Barcelona bidders, Ignasi Serrallach i Mas and La Maquinista Terrestre i Marítima, competed with the Paris company of Gustave Eiffel, which was building railway bridges across the peninsula at the time. Eiffel's firm won with a budget of 22,500 pesetas. Work ran late and only ended in July 1877 with the load test; the company added street lamps as a gift.

   In 1959 an asphalt surface was laid over the deck, and the trapped damp damaged the structure. In 1979 it was replaced with oak and the ironwork reinforced, which is the wood you walk on now.

   Stand in the middle and look along the river: this is where the walk ends. The bridge is free and open at all hours. If you want to go back to the Rambla, the GPS navigation in your browser can lead you there.

   Local name

   Pont Palanques Vermelles

   Hours

   Open 24/7

   Price

   Free

   Location

   Eiffel Bridge on Google Maps ↗

Shorter Ways Through Girona

You can join the route at any stop, so it splits easily into two halves or turns into a quick outdoor walk.

Romanesque morning

Stops: 1, 2, 3, 4

For anyone who loves old stone and carved capitals. From the Rambla to Sant Pere is 690 m and 11 min of walking. Basilica de Sant Feliu, the Arab Baths and Monastery Sant Pere de Galligants all charge entry. With visits, count on about two hours.

Walls, cathedral and the Call

Stops: 5, 6, 7, 8

For a first visit with limited time: Roman walls, the great Gothic nave, the Jewish quarter and the river. 780 m and 12 min of walking. Girona Cathedral and the Museum of Jewish History charge entry; walls and bridge are free. Plan just under three hours.

Free outdoor walk

Stops: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8

For tight budgets or a first look on arrival day: the whole route from outside, without tickets. 27 min of walking; with time to look at façades, walk a stretch of the walls and stand on the bridge, about an hour and a half.

How Long Does This Girona Tour Take, With and Without the Interiors?

The walking itself takes 27 min, because the old town is compact: no leg is longer than 410 m. What fills the day are the interiors. Allow roughly half an hour for Sant Feliu, twenty minutes for the Arab Baths, forty for Sant Pere and its cloister, half an hour on the walls, an hour in the cathedral and three quarters of an hour in the Jewish museum.

A sample day: start on the Rambla at 10:00, reach the Arab Baths just before 11:00, the cathedral around 12:35 and the Eiffel Bridge around 14:30. The Romanesque half alone fits into a morning, the walls and cathedral half into an afternoon, and the outdoor version into an hour and a half.

Before You Set Off in Girona

• Start: Rambla de la Llibertat is the recommended start, but you can join at any stop and pick up the order from there.
• End: Eiffel Bridge on the Onyar. If you want to return to the Rambla, the GPS navigation in your browser can lead you back.
• Best days: Tuesday to Saturday works best, because on Mondays and Sundays not every interior keeps its regular hours.
• Time of day: Start in the morning, once the paid sights are open, so the interiors line up with the walk.
• Costs: The five interiors charge entry. The Rambla, the walls and the bridge are free.

Common Questions About Walking Girona