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As much as I love travel quotes and reflecting on the things travel teaches us, quotes about Spain have always held a special kind of magic for me. If you love Spain, don’t miss the joy of reminding yourself. Read this inspiring list of Spain Travel Quotes.

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Dreamy Travel Quotes About Spain

First of all, I was completely in love with Spain back when I moved here. Over the years, my feelings and relationship with this country have evolved. Nevertheless, up to the day I´m writing this – I love living in Spain, and I still wouldn’t want to have it any other way. I enjoy waking up to the Spanish sun, celebrating outrageous local festivities, and blending into the otherworldly beautiful landscapes of the Iberian Peninsula.

Today, almost 15 years after beginning a new Spanish chapter of my life – I still feel blessed to call this place my home. That´s a big statement to make about any place.

Relationship with places

Actually, my affection for Spain has gone through different stages. In fact, the more I go in-depth about this topic, the more I understand that Roman Payne was right in comparing places to people. For an avid traveler, a relationship with cities or countries isn´t any less unique than the important human connections we make through life.

“Cities were always like people, showing their varying personalities to the traveler. Depending on the city and on the traveler, there might begin a mutual love, or dislike, friendship, or enmity. Where one city will rise a certain individual to glory, it will destroy another who is not suited to its personality. Only through travel can we know where we belong or not, where we are loved and where we are rejected.” – Roman Payne

So, ever since my first visit to Spain, I was obsessed with crossing off my Spain bucket list all of its top landmarks and learning Spanish ASAP. Later on, after turning into an expat in Spain, I was passionate about getting an insider look into the life of the Spaniards, and getting to know their inexplicable habits. Thanks to my in-laws I´ve become a part of the traditional Spanish family, and later on, somehow I adopted the Spanish lifestyle that became an essential part of me.

Nowadays, when I officially hold a Spanish nationality, to my biggest surprise I haven´t lost even the least interest in this country. I do travel more off the beaten track and focus my adventures on discovering secret villages, non-touristic museums, and traditional foods.

Therefore, my love story with Spain actually shows that it is possible that the bond we make with certain places can actually last longer than 50% of marriages worldwide that end in divorce.

Reading about Spain

But even if you don’t have any travel experiences in Spain – reading, writing, and making plans about Spain isn’t any less inspiring than traveling around it. As Ernest Hemingway once said: “For one person who likes Spain there are a dozen who prefer books on her.”

Indeed, Spain is such a vibrant and colorful country that it’s a joy to visit it through popular TV shows and unique contemporary novels without leaving the comfort of your couch.

Let me share with you the travel quotes about Spain that, in my opinion, attempt to unveil the magic this country withholds.

Favorite Travel Quotes About Spain

Spain Travel Quotes from World Literature

“There is no nightlife in Spain. They stay up late but they get up late. That is not nightlife. That is delaying the day.” –  Ernest Hemingway

“Those who have entered it honorably, and no men ever entered earth more honorably than those who died in Spain, already have achieved immortality.” – Ernest Hemingway

“The air soft as that of Seville in April, and so fragrant that it was delicious to breathe it.” – Christopher Columbus

 “Spain, the beautiful country of wine and songs.” – Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

“In Spain the dead are more alive than the dead of any other country in the world.” – Federico Garcia Lorca

“Coming in solemn beauty like slow old tunes of Spain.” – John Masefield

“Spain is an overflow of sombreness . . . a strong and threatening tide of history meets you at the frontier.” – Wyndham Lewis

“I would sooner be a foreigner in Spain than in most countries. How easy it is to make friends in Spain!” – George Orwell

“Spain – a great whale stranded on the shores of Europe.” – Elizabeth Oakes Smith

Travel Quotes About Spain
Dreamy Travel Quotes About Spain

Let me add to this list of Travel Quotes about Spain a few words from Anthony Bourdain, as he created some of the best travel documentaries of the modern times.

“Any reasonable, sentient person who looks at Spain, comes to Spain, eats in Spain, drinks in Spain, they’re going to fall in love. Otherwise, there’s something deeply wrong with you. This is the dream of all the world.” – Anthony Bourdain

“Spain is the sort of place that never really made any sense anyway. But in the very best possible way. This is the country that gave us the Spanish Inquisition. Also anarchy. This is where devout Catholicism mixes with surrealism, modernist cuisine with traditional tapas. Christianity and Islam traded places and shared space. And the effects and influences of all those things are right here to see. ” – Anthony Bourdain

“You’d have a hard time finding anything better than Barcelona for food, as far as being a hub. Given a choice between Barcelona and San Sebastian to die in, I’d probably want to die in San Sebastian.” – Anthony Bourdain

P.S. San Sebastian is also one of my Spanish favourites.

However, the vast majority of travel quotes about Spain particularly focus on two of its beautiful cities – Barcelona and Granada.

Dreamy Travel Quotes About Spain
Dreamy Travel Quotes About Spain

Granada Travel Quotes

“Perhaps there never was a monument more characteristic of an age and people than the Alhambra; a rugged fortress without, a voluptuous palace within; war frowning from its battlements; poetry breathing throughout the fairy architecture of its halls.” – Washington Irving

“Never in my life have I lived in a place more delightful and never will I find one the same”. – Washington Irving

“In Granada, there are more enchantments than scarlet seeds in the fruit of the valleys.” – Victor Hugo

“Granada is Spain’s most valued treasure; a melting pot of flavours, smells and passion.” – Victor Hugo

“Every city has its own charm, but Granada has its own and that of the rest.” – Antonio Machado

“All curious travelers hold Granada in their hearts, without ever visiting it.” – William Shakespeare

“Ah, the storybook kingdom of Granada. One of the oldest, most complex, magically surreal places in Spain. And one of the most beautiful.” – Anthony Bourdain

“Granada is so moving that it stimulates and melts all of the senses”. – Henri Matisse

“Granada; more dazzling than the flower and more flavourful than the fruit it is named after, like a virgin lying in the sun.” – Alexandre Dumas

“The truth is, that I’m beginning to wonder if there is any greater pleasure in life than visiting Granada. …and it is going back and visiting it again.” – Alexandre Dumas

“If you were to visit just one city in Spain, it should be Granada” – Ernest Hemingway

“Yes, the impact of your wonderful Granada is within me; sad, so sad, but a sadness so attractive that it draws me in and carries me with it like a thread through a needle. I need to take in each and every aspect of Granada” – Juan Ramón Jimenez

“It was Granada… rich and overpowering… They called it the Damascus of the West.” – Pedro Antonio de Alarcón

Dreamy Travel Quotes About Spain
Dreamy Travel Quotes About Spain

Barcelona Travel Quotes

”We crossed spacious streets, with buildings resembling palaces, in La Rambla promenade; the shops were well illuminated and there was movement and life… I did not decide to go to sleep, even though I wished to, so I could rise early and contemplate, in daylight, this city, unknown to me: Barcelona, capital of Catalonia ”- Hans Christian Andersen

“Barcelona – shelter of the foreigners, hospital of the poor, father-land of  the brave, vengeance of the offended and pleasant correspondence of firm friendship, and in site, and in beauty, unique” – Miguel de Cervantes

Also read: The Don Quixote Route in Spain

“Barcelona is a very old city in which you can feel the weight of history; it is haunted by history. You cannot walk around it without perceiving it.”- Carlos Ruiz Zafon

“I see cities as organisms, as living creatures. To me, Madrid is a man and Barcelona is a woman. And it’s a woman who’s extremely vain. One of the great Catalan poets, Joan Maragall, wrote this famous poem in which he called Barcelona the great enchantress of some kind of sorceress, and in which the city has this dark enticing presence that seduces and lures people. I think Barcelona has a lot of that.” – Carlos Ruiz Zafon

Dreamy Travel Quotes About Spain
Dreamy Travel Quotes About Spain

Some say that writers are known for their sharp eyes. Because they do notice things that might escape the tourist’s attention. So let´s trust the greatest novelists and travelers on the fact that Spain is full of places that are extremely inspiring and unique.

While I´m not a Hemingway, or at least not yet, I could only sum up all of the above by saying that one can definitely live in Spain all of his/her life and keep rekindling romance with this country every single day.

What about you? Would you be willing to try?

P.S. Blog subscribers, don´t forget to grab your free download – Dreamy Spain Travel Notebook with Quotes.

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Dreamy Travel Quotes About Spain

For more Spain travel tips and itineraries check my Pinterest boards Best of Spain and Spain Travel Collection.

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