What is UrbanBuddy?

It’s Good to Be in the Know
24 hours a day
Urban­Buddy was born out of the com­bined expe­ri­ences of 4 stu­dents dur­ing their jour­ney through Europe and study­ing abroad in Barcelona, Spain. An Urban­Buddy describes a local who is avail­able for stu­dents and trav­el­ers 24 hours a day. Think of Urban­Buddy as a new type of city concierge […]

La Fiesta Mejor de Gracia

If you’re in Barcelona this week (Aug. 15th — 21st, 2010) you must check out La Fiesta Major de Gra­cia, or ‘Gra­cia Par­ties.’ The streets are trans­formed every year into themed dis­plays that inspire your imag­i­na­tion. Head on up to Gra­cia, Metro L3 Fontana, and make your way to Car­rer Verdi.
Here you will find streets transformed. […]

traveling abroad?

Urban­Buddy is con­nect­ing peo­ple to place all around the world. Whether you’re in New York, Budapest or Barcelona we’ll give you the tools to see the world as locals do. We are on-location and liv­ing the truth of each rec­om­men­da­tion we pro­vide.
Hav­ing an Urban­Buddy:) pro­vides the piece of mind of a 24 hour con­tact for […]

Free City WiFi | Barcelona

WELCOME TO BARCLEONA WiFi

What is Barcelona WiFi?
Barcelona WiFi is a free city ser­vice that allows you to con­nect to the Inter­net through WiFi access points, or hotspots, located in var­i­ous plazas and munic­i­pal­i­ties.
“The City Coun­cil pro­vides the Barcelona WiFi Ser­vice with the aim of encour­ag­ing city access to the Inter­net and help­ing the pub­lic incorporate […]

IaaC Architecture | Barcelona

Lec­ture Open Sessions

IaaC is host­ing and open house called  HelloWorld@IaaC, in Barcelona on Tues­day 3rd of Novem­ber. The event will start with an Open Lec­ture of Michel Rojkind: ‘Risk Con­t­a­m­i­na­tions’ and will close with Music, Media and Cock­tails. Fol­low­ing the event there will will be an open ses­sion with tours and pre­sen­ta­tions about the school […]

Barcelona in Progress | Glories Park

Barcelona in Progress
The pro­posed Glo­ries Plaza will be a new point of cen­tral­ity of the Cata­lan cap­i­tal of Barcelona. The future plaza-park is located at the junc­tion of three major axis in the city, the main thor­ough­fares of Barcelona (Gran Via, Diag­o­nal and Merid­i­ana). The exist­ing Glo­ries ‘Eye’ or ele­vated road­way has been a source […]

Barcelona 22@

Barcelona 22@
22@Barcelona is build­ing a new com­pact city, where the most inno­v­a­tive com­pa­nies co-exist with research, train­ing and tech trans­fer cen­ters, as well as hous­ing (4,000 new sub­si­dized res­i­dences), facil­i­ties (145,000 m2 of land) and green areas (114,000 m2).
The 22@Barcelona plan aims to ren­o­vate the indus­trial land of Poble­nou in order to cre­ate a district […]

urbanFAB [workshop]

Urban­Buddy (www.urbanbuddy.com) and the Live archi­tec­ture Net­work (www.livearchitecture.net) are col­lab­o­rat­ing to orga­nize a series of cost-effective design work­shops for stu­dents and other inter­ested par­ties, to be held in mul­ti­ple loca­tions each year.
Par­tic­i­pants in urban­FAB will travel to either Barcelona, Chicago or New York City to simul­ta­ne­ously research and explore the unique urban fab­ri­ca­tion. The urban­FAB [workshop] […]

Airport Tips

Trans­port to and from the air­port: we rec­om­mend tak­ing the Aer­oBus. Cost is about 5 euros, as opposed to the 30 euro taxi ride. Best is to catch it in Plaza Catalunya but be sure you know what ter­mi­nal, there’s two dif­fer­ent buses: dark blue T2 and light blue T1 (tell the dri­ver your airline […]

Presidential Study Abroad

“I’d like to find new ways to con­nect young Amer­i­cans to young peo­ple all around the world, by sup­port­ing oppor­tu­ni­ties to learn new lan­guages … and study. That’s always been a crit­i­cal part of how Amer­ica engages the world … Sim­ple exchanges can break down walls between us, for when peo­ple come together and speak […]

Be in the Know

Wouldn’t you be inter­ested in a 24 hour local con­tact while abroad? Pre­sum­ably you would and that’s exactly what Urban­Buddy offers!
Think of an Urban­Buddy as a new type of city guru avail­able 24 hours a day to rec­om­mend places, events and knowl­edge for your des­ti­na­tion city. They are real peo­ple to keep you ahead of […]

Hotel Barcelo Raval

If you’re look­ing for mod­ern, edgy and provoca­tive, you’ve come to the right hotel. Hotel Barcelo Raval is the one hotel that doesn’t fol­low the same-old inter­na­tional design aes­thet­ics. It’s famous B Lounge was designed by Jordi Gali, in coop­er­a­tion with the up and com­ing design stu­dio Wanda Barcelona, with the […]

Hotel Barcelo Exclusive 15%

15% Exclu­sive Dis­count with Advance Book­ing
With Urban­Buddy, get many more perks at the Barcelo Raval. Enjoy free room upgrades, BBox meals and BLounge VIP!
Barcelo.com always pro­vides the best offers and the low­est Rate Online, guar­an­teed for the hotel Barceló Raval.
It is strate­gi­cally sit­u­ated in the heart of the city, in el Raval, the most fash­ion­able area in […]

Monster Jam Barcelona

Barcelona | Sat­ur­day the 24th of Octo­ber 2009 | Mon­ster Jam
The world’s largest mon­ster truck show on tour inter­na­tion­ally, will make its first ever stop in Spain on Octo­ber 24, 2009, at the ’92 Olympic Sta­dium in Barcelona. Other Euro­pean cities on tour include Fin­land (Helsinki) and Swe­den (Stock­holm).
“Tick­ets for Mon­ster Jam, on October […]

Barcelona | La Merce | 150th Year of Cerda

Cerda’s Design of the ‘Barcelona Block’
Don’t Miss: Cerda Expo­si­tions (For a com­plete list of the expos visit the offi­cial web­site, click here)
Web­site menu (trans­lated) , click here
‘Barcelona Block’ Back­ground:
(trans­la­tion cour­tesy of Google trans­la­tion, errors may occur)
Now, 150 years ago, on June 7, 1859 approved the reform plan and Eix­am­ple, the work of one of the most […]

Barcelona | La Merce | Music

*Because there are over 100 music venues dur­ing La Merce, we will only high­light the BAM music fes­ti­val below. For the entire list of La Merce music events click here (use Google trans­la­tor for Eng­lish)
Don’t Miss: #20 down on the list: ‘The Hives’ Sat­ur­day, 9/26,  from 19:30 to 24:00 pm, Free
Web­site menu (trans­lated), click here

MUSIC / […]

Barcelona | Street Concert

On the 19th of Sep­tem­ber (this Sat­ur­day) the streets of Barcelona will come alive! The Span­ish sure do know how to party and even though summer’s over, it’s no excuse to stop danc­ing! …and the beer is cheap (1.50euro)
The street party in the Poble Nou neigh­bor­hood is every night this week. The main con­cert is […]

The National Day of Catalonia

It’s a long week­end in Barcelona (National Day of Cat­alo­nia) and there’s lots of events in store to suit all tastes. The pools are still open and the many muse­ums are free to the pub­lic, not to men­tion the the­atres, cin­e­mas, activ­i­ties, sports etc. Most of all it’s going to be a beau­ti­ful day so […]

Jeff in Barcelona

“Urban­Buddy is like a concierge ser­vice, but one that does not direct you toward the most touristy and bor­ing places in a city.”
“Urban Buddy is look­ing awe­some, I think you did a great job the web­site! Seri­ously, I will use it the next time I travel to Europe.
Is there any­thing else even like Urban­Buddy avail­able for […]

Spanish Tapas

Tapas is a tra­di­tional Span­ish word refer­ring to a vari­ety of appe­tiz­ers or starters in the Span­ish cui­sine. The word “tapas” is derived from the Span­ish verb tapar, “to cover.”
Through­out the his­tory of Spain bar­tenders have served their bev­er­ages with a small por­tion of food ‘atop the glass,’ an effort to keep flies away and […]

Professor Richard S. Hawks

“Paul Brogna is a recent grad­u­ate from our Land­scape Archi­tec­ture pro­gram at SUNY ESF and cur­rently lives in Barcelona, Spain. He is a tal­ented land­scape archi­tect and is act­ing as an on-location con­sul­tant (UrbanBuddy:)Barcelona) to this year’s SUNY ESF off cam­pus stu­dents, who have already arrived in Barcelona. Paul is also a great guy who knows the […]

Hospital del Mar

If you’re in Barcelona and need to see a doc­tor, this is the place to be. Hos­pi­tal del Mar is about the only place you’ll find Eng­lish speak­ing doc­tors who are sur­pris­ingly help­ful! Granted it’s like any big city emer­gency room, expect the long wait (from our expe­ri­ence, about 2 hours).
Loca­tion: Pas­seig Marí­tim (La Barceloneta) 25–29, […]

Opium Mar, Barcelona

Opium Mar, one of Barcelona’s trendi­est clubs. It’s the place you bring your friends whom you want to impress. For sure one of the best places to see and be seen, just be aware it’s a bit pricey– not unlike the best of New York or Lon­don– it just comes with the name.
Opium is located just […]

Our Service

Who is Urban­Buddy?
Urban­Buddy is a net­work of  real peo­ple avail­able for sup­port and ref­er­ence dur­ing your trip abroad.

Sim­ply put, an Urban­Buddy is an on-location expert whom pro­vides the resources to con­nect you to your answers.
What is Urban­Buddy?
The Urban­Buddy net­work pow­ers a new way for real peo­ple to con­nect to places across the globe.
Why an Urban­Buddy?
We’ve done […]

Tim in Barcleona

“My UrbanBuddy:)Barcelona, Paul, was a huge help when I moved to Barcelona as a stu­dent in 2008.  He helped us find a great apart­ment in in the best part of the city and got me in con­tact with the renters.  Once we got set­tled in he showed us around the city and got us familiar […]

Sleeping in Barcelona

Barcelona is packed with hun­dreds of hotels. Small, large, water­front, moun­tain­top, gay friendly– you name it we’ve got it.
Urban­Buddy can hook you up with any­thing that suits your needs. We know just the right places whether for that hon­ey­moon vaca­tion or a long-term study abroad stay, we know exactly the right place to match your needs.
Like any […]

Travel List

Your Urban­Buddy
Pass­port
Visa
Insur­ance card

Must Have Electronics

A small water­proof, seal­able bag to pro­tect your elec­tron­ics

Handy to Have

A good guide book (LeCool is our favorite)
A jour­nal (with both a pen and mechan­i­cal pen­cil)
A small com­pact game (elec­tronic Catch Phrase is per­fect) or deck of cards
Lan­guage dic­tio­nary or elec­tronic trans­la­tor
Inter­na­tional cell phone with inter­net access (iPhone or Black­berry)
Earplugs […]

Packing Basics

Pack light—when you think you have every­thing you need and noth­ing else, take half of every­thing away.
Pack­ing is all about multi-use—this is true with cloth­ing, toi­letries, make-up, and elec­tron­ics.
Iden­tity your most […]