Our clocks went forward 1 hour, luckily I’d set an alarm (although we didn’t need it) as we had a 10.30 booking at the refugi 370 & had decided to walk, a 58 min trip. We set off at 9.15am & as usual google maps didn’t seem to reduce the time to destination!! The streets were quiet, we had a nice walk down La Rambla before it got really full of tourists. We arrived at the shelter at 10.25, perfect.
Shelter 307 is one of the bomb shelters that were built during the Spanish Civil War to protect the population from the indiscriminate bombing to which Barcelona was subjected. It was excavated thanks to the efforts of the population of the Poble Sec district being mainly women, children & the elderly, as the men would have been fighting at the front. It is one of the more than 1,000 bomb shelters built in Barcelona during the Spanish Civil War, an example of passive defence in the city, in which the Republican Army, the Generalitat de Catalunya (Catalan Government), the City Council and the people of Barcelona all played a part.
The shelter has three entrances onto Nou de la Rambla street, and comprises nearly 400 metres of tunnels, with a height of 2.10 metres and a width of between 1.5 and 2 metres. It has a number of different facilities, including a toilet, a water fountain, an infirmary, a children's room and a fireplace. Our guide was brilliant & described the anguish suffered by the people of the city during the Civil War, when they were forced to face a new phenomenon: the bombing of the civil population, a military practice that had only been briefly tried out during the First World War.

Barcelona was used as a test city for the bombing of civilians, a practice that during the Second World War would be used on the rest of Europe. Shelter 307 is also a memorial to the people's struggle to survive in the face of adversity. Although we had been in a shelter in Murcia, having a guide explain was great, there was also far more information provided upon entry, timelines & some photos, especially those taken from the air of the devastation on the ground.
After the tour we found a coffee shop, for a coffee & toilet!! & headed back to La Rambla to find a tourist information centre & a map. It was really busy, we went into 2 offices but they both seemed to be selling tours, & then noticed the familiar white I & directions. We purchased a map in Plaza Catalunya for €1, I’d wanted to also see Casa Batllo & Casa Mila on the way home, we couldn’t locate Casa Batllo, it was marked on the map but not there .... we have since read that it’s covered in scaffolding under renovation so that’s maybe why we couldn’t see it. We’ll head to Casa Mila on our way to La Sagrada Familia tomorrow. We walked home, past a number of lovely buildings, purchasing a quiche & apple tart on the way & ate a late lunch. I’ve now marked on the map what we want to visit, I’ve also booked tickets for Palau de la Musica for Tuesday, I hope I can take photos.