The screenwriter and humorist Maria Rovira, also known as Oye Sherman, believes we should rethink tourism: “We Barcelonians who go away should think about the logic we suffer in the city all year round and ask ourselves if we are becoming gentrifying agents in other towns and cities”.Following this reflection, he chooses cinemas as his favorite place, a cool space with air conditioning and a window to the world. He suggests going to the cinemas, “perhaps this way we can manage to keep them alive until September and they don’t become a supermarket, a clothing store or an establishment without history or personality”. He recalls that in his neighborhood, more than ten years ago, the Lauren Horta cinema closed, which became a Condis.To the screenwriter, who this summer is making a series of film recommendations in Retorn al videoclub by ARA, she also likes to go to Filmoteca, Verdi cinemas and Renoir Floridablanca: “Actually I like them all. Balmes is huge, it looks like a kind of space shuttle”. She admits she is not one of those people who prefer to watch a film practically alone in the room, she prefers to experience the screening as a collective experience, beyond the people she might go with, “as long as it coincides with a civilized audience”. This special connection is usually with films shown at festivals: “It's a unique experience, which I do much less often than I'd like. Normally, premieres coincide with a time slot when I'm working, on television, or performing a gig.” Despite this, he usually checks the schedules for IN-EDIT Barcelona, D'A, or DocsBarcelona, which he particularly likes. Let's see if he can combine it to go: “This year I was at Docs, a real triumph.”For years I had gone to the cinema a lot, “it's the typical thing that I don't do as much as I would like and I intend to correct it,” she comments. She also considers the option of the cinema when she is in a city that is not her own, especially if she is doing tourism, it is summer and it is hot: “It is the perfect time to stop, rest and have an interesting experience besides the film: seeing what the cinemas are like and the people who go there is another way to get to know places”. When she manages to go to the cinema, she is one of those who buys tickets in advance, "it's already exceptional enough to venture out and have to watch it from the corner." Remembering, she recalls when she saw Mullholland drive from the side front row, a disaster. If she can choose, no morning or very late sessions, as she tends to fall asleep, and preferably in the original version, "although as a child I watched them dubbed." When she was a little girl and discovered voice actors, she was very excited to know that Pep Anton Muñoz voiced many bad Disney characters or that Ross from Friends and Timon from The Lion King were the same voice.

Although she had been one of its drivers, the Process caught Solidaritat off guard. In 2012, the party that had made a name for itself two years earlier by proclaiming itself heir to the popular consultations, failed to enter Parliament. Alfons López Tena (Sagunt, 1957) was its candidate. This notary, son of a notary, who spent seven years (2001-2008) on the CGPJ at the proposal of CiU, continued to be active in the movement until 2015, waiting to see where Catalan independence was heading. But in 2014, with the 9-N consultation, he became clear. In conversation with ARA, he explains how what happened from then on convinced him that it was all "a farce." In fact, on that very day, together with a group of people, they began to popularize the concept of "processism": that movement that claims to yearn for independence but, in reality, never wants it to arrive. Distant from "processist" parties, he has accumulated criticism, for example, for participating in a Societat Civil Catalana symposium in 2018 ("I went there to defend my thesis on authoritarian populisms that I also detect in the Process") or for saying in 2023 that he would vote for the PSOE to prevent the far-right from coming to power in Spain.

Txabi Franquesa defines himself without complexes as "the summer Grinch". Heat distresses him, sleeping without a fan is impossible for him ("it has to be a ceiling one!") and, in addition, he associates this time of year with tours, sticky sweat and drops in blood pressure. It is coherent, therefore, that the summer night he has chosen to share is memorable precisely for everything that went wrong. "Although I laugh about it now, at the time it seemed like one of the most humiliating moments of my life," he recalls.

The covid-19 pandemic caught the world off guard and, when the virus broke out in Catalonia, Joan Guix (Barcelona, 1950) was the highest authority in public health in the country. He was at the forefront of the health emergency and lived with uncertainty the arrival of a new disease caused by an unknown virus that was fully impacting a health system ill-prepared to face it. An epidemiologist and doctor in preventive medicine and public health, Guix was the number two in the Department of Health during the first months of the crisis, and also the person who represented Catalonia in the meetings of the interterritorial council with the Ministry of Health.

Almost every Sunday, except when he is traveling, we can find Xavier Marcet on the mountain of Sant Llorenç del Munt and the L'Obac mountain range. It is where the driving force behind the humanist management movement and vice-president of the Marlex group has always gone for walks, first with his grandparents, then with his father, also with his children, and even with his grandchildren. Cala, his dog, always accompanies him now, and when he can, he shares the walk with his friend, Ramon: “It’s the place I miss the most when I’m away, I go there practically every week. It’s a natural park not so big that you can’t find a new route each time you go, but big enough to have a small festival each time I discover a new path,” he explains, satisfied. For Marcet, it is much more than a beautiful landscape: it is a very emotional landscape full of family memories. He assures that it is perfect when he needs solace or to find himself, he has lived many hours of serenity and contemplation of beauty there, with views of Montseny, the Pyrenees and the sea. When he arrives tired from traveling, he goes there because it is a space that welcomes and heals him, where he regenerates better: “Happiness is returning to familiar places. A part of my happiness is returning to Sant Llorenç, which is part of my life; this is where we end up going for walks to celebrate good things.” His passion for the mountains has become the perfect excuse to give him gifts: “I could put on a fashion show, nothing to do with Grandpa's espadrilles and velvet trousers.” His favorite place in Catalonia is this landscape with a geological typology similar to Montserrat, with a lot of human intervention – there are charcoal pits and forestry work has been done – where episodes of the Carlist wars also took place and there were refugees after the Civil War. He has magnificent memories of walking with his father and grandfather, who told him stories of bandits and the war: “These stories, which are the ones that remain, are a way of humanizing the mountain and making it our own. I would like to pass on this emotional legacy,” he acknowledges. Walks in the natural park are also associated with the family dogs, who have been very present in the way of living with the mountains. He explains that walking is going there with the dog: “Now with Cala, but before with Xica, Linda or Xispa. It’s very hard for me to go if he’s not well, I feel sorry. I experience it as a betrayal”. Normally, they go on three or four-hour excursions, and they always try to avoid the main routes. On weekends there are thousands of people, but on their routes they only encounter six or seven; this way they can experience the mountain in a context of silence. They only like it to be broken by the sound of birds or an animal. Even when talking, they try to maintain this silence, "it's a way of respecting it, of taking care of it".

For the influencer Àlex Tous, the best summer night isn't just one, it's practically all the Sant Joan eves he has experienced in Cadaqués. It's a completely established family tradition: going up there with friends, celebrating his mother's birthday, and extending the party until sunrise. “It's a super nice day for the whole family and friends,” he assures.

In 2014, José Manuel Pinto played his last match as a footballer for Barça. The Andalusian goalkeeper, born in El Puerto de Santa María in 1975, won a lot of titles in the blaugrana goal, even though he didn't play more than thirty matches because he was usually Víctor Valdés's substitute. A decade later, Pinto doesn't stand still. Five years ago, he announced the birth of P13Fit, a project that unites his two great passions: sport and music. "I thought the best idea was to merge them," he explains. The project consists of an ideal training method "for all types of people where you have a good time," as you jump rope while following a pattern of exercises and movements to the rhythm of music.

Being from Montblanc, the Pyrenees that communicator Candela Figueras first knew, and that she likes, are those of Pallars Jussà and Sobirà. But she has ended up in Cerdanya. “For me, Cerdanya was the Pyrenees of the people from Barcelona, with the Cadí tunnel giving access. And perhaps, I even underestimated it a little, but now that I know it, I know it is a privileged, authentic and well-connected place. And I feel fortunate to be able to enjoy it”. Furthermore, one of the sports she has always liked is skiing, because it combines nature, adrenaline and can be done in a group. She is also fascinated by the stone villages, finding genuine local people there, hearing the cows moo and the bells ring, and seeing people working the fields. Having grown up between Lilla and Montblanc, Candela likes village life, its different houses clinging to each other, people greeting each other in the streets and chatting in bars, seeing the worked fields, the livestock grazing and hearing the hours strike on the church bell tower. “They give me peace and calm. And I find that in Cerdanya, although I admit that many weekends we move around the region fleeing the crowds that are there,” she explains. She has the theory that village people understand each other, as if they had a special DNA: “You have to win them over little by little and then they give you everything, like farm cats, which are distrustful at first, but then they are close and generous. I feel at home here.”For the last four or five years, whenever he can he escapes there on weekends and in the summer: “I am lucky and privileged to be able to be here and disconnect, in an apartment that my in-laws bought many years ago”. He enjoys walking with the dogs on a clearing near home, from where he sees Tosa and Cadí. When they walk in winter, he is amazed by the cold mist that comes out first thing in the morning. “Small details that I didn’t need before, but now I think I wish I could live here for a season”. He believes that everyone has various favorite places depending on their life stage, and now his calls for Saga: “I like to see Gus and Leia running freely on the paths and without strident noises, so different from Barcelona”. He comments that their energy changes when they are there, and he loves to see them so relaxed and calm.If he doesn't go skiing, he prefers to get up calmly, let the sheets stick a little, make a coffee, go for a walk in the mountains, perhaps reach Ger, dip in the pool, talk to Izaskun from the beach bar, return home, do a little work and go to a bar to chat: “At David’s in Alp I meet people who are like family, I like to meet Isidru or Keke and chat for a while. I'm happy having a vermouth with them”. When he is in Cerdanya, he takes the opportunity to rest and disconnect. It seems curious to him that when he lived in Montblanc he needed the freedom that Barcelona offered him. And now he needs the village life, the calm of the mountain, the dip in the pool, and the relaxed hours.

The most fun summer night Charlie Pee remembers seemed, at first, doomed to disaster. She and a group of friends had taken the last flight of the day from Barcelona to Mallorca to start their vacation, but a breakdown put an end to their plans. “They changed the plane for another that had fewer seats and we were left out,” she explains. Result: she, two of her friends, and about twenty other people were left behind while most of the group of friends landed calmly in Mallorca.

Pep Parés was a popular face of the first Televisió de Catalunya thanks to two iconic characters: the adventurer Oliana Molls (1985-1987) and our first ecological consciousness, Captain Lettuce (1994). At that time, he was also the face of a sport as little known until then as mushing, and he directed the Pirena sled dog race for 22 editions (1990-2012). Furthermore, Parés continued to work as an actor (the last professional play was "The Jewish Woman, by Bertold Brecht, in 2003-2004) and chaired Amnesty International in Catalonia (2007-2011). He also mobilized for the National Pact for the Referendum.

When actress Marta Belmonte was in her early twenties, she took one of her first trips with friends to the Catalan Pyrenees. The objective was to hike the Carros de Foc route within the Aigüestortes National Park and Estany de Sant Maurici, a circular mountain route that connects nine refuges. “It was an improvised getaway, I hadn't prepared anything and I joined at the last minute, perhaps that's why it surprised me so much and I have a very good memory of the landscape and the whole experience. They were incredible days,” she comments. She admits she wasn't very physically prepared. While doing the route, she grumbled a bit, and in the end, they decided not to finish the trek: "Even so, it was fantastic. There were three of us friends, we were carrying backpacks and tents to camp in the middle of nature, in case we didn't reach the refuges. It's a spectacular area, I'd like to go back, now I would finish the entire route." Although she has been to the Pyrenees more times, she has done so more towards France and the Huesca area. She has never repeated the Carros de Foc. Belmonte believes that sometimes we go far away to see spectacular places and it wouldn't be necessary, "Catalonia is impressive, with a brutal diversity of landscapes that has nothing to envy other places. I really like green and water, seas, rivers… and Estany de Sant Maurici is extraordinary," she points out. The route was very varied, it was spring and the temperature changed a lot depending on the altitude and the time of day, they went from wearing short sleeves to treading snow.

When Ramon Cugat thinks of a great summer night, he doesn't hesitate for a second. He goes straight to July 17th, fifty years ago, the day of his wedding to Montse, whom he met when they were only ten and fifteen years old. The ceremony was prepared at the family estate in Polinyà del Vallès: tables in the garden, a swimming pool, a tennis court, and hundreds of guests ready to extend the party well into the night. The sky, however, had other plans.

During the nineties of the last century, Father Apeles (Barcelona, 1966) was a recurring television presence. Ordained priest in 1993, he built a parallel career as a commentator and polemicist, appearing on Canal 9 programs and, subsequently, entering the Mediaset universe through spaces like "Moors and Christians and The Martian Chronicles. It even had its own space, Quote with Apelles (1997), a talk show of ephemeral life that she co-presented with Rocío Carrasco, daughter of Rocío Jurado, and which was produced by Gestmusic.

The street Nou de la Rambla in Barcelona is the favorite place in Catalonia of the philosopher and cultural communicator Leo Espluga. After thinking about it a lot, he has decided that he would choose a place where he feels rooted, even though it is not the city where he was born.“I'm from Castelldefels, but when I started working in Barcelona, I came to this area. This was the first place I moved to and I worked very close by. I like that it connects Paral·lel with El Raval and Poble-sec, and you can find the city's underground here. Now I also live very close, two streets away”. Before living here, when I was in Castelldefels and came down to Barcelona to go out at night, I had already discovered it, I used to go to Apolo, Sala Meteoro, Tequila Boom Boom, Bósforo and other typical places in the area. And when I settled in the city, without being very aware of it, I spent a lot of time around here. For Espluga, Nou de la Rambla is the epicentre, a fairly central axis in the lower part of the city, which represents the Barcelona she likes, with a different social composition, many local people who have lived there for a long time: “There are migrations of many types and with a certain sense of locality, who coexist with professionals from the more creative world, who also give the neighborhood its character”. The virtues continue: it has fantastic light, it is close to the sea and, if you go all the way up, you reach Montjuïc, where he finds a lot of peace. He believes it is increasingly difficult to find corners like this, "because there is always something that distorts": "There are streets that have soul, but they are a bit threatened by different elements. Now I see that the composition of Poble-sec is changing, it is being gentrified and at the same time there are more people sleeping on the street. It's complex, it has powerful spaces like Sala Meteoro and other small projects that are threatened because they don't have enough money".Leo Espluga remembers that he often used to go for breakfast at a traditional bar on Blai street, Bodega Vidal, which was run by two fantastic women, but it also had to close. "And little by little, you run out of important places," he comments. Also, important people in his social life live a few streets away from Nou de la Rambla. Coincidence? "Not so much, we live around here because it continues to be a place with charm and soul, without so many tourists, and even though prices are expensive, they are less exorbitant than elsewhere," he explains. The philosopher particularly likes the upper stretch of street, the connection with the entrance to Montjuïc, where the Sala Apolo is located, and then, going down, he especially recommends in spring and October the intersection with Paral·lel: “In the morning and at dusk it has a beautiful light,” he assures. 

For many years of her life, Laia Sanz has spent her summers racing. Being a fourteen-time world champion and ten-time European champion means training a lot and having few holidays. “I was doing something I really liked and I didn't feel like it was a sacrifice or that I was missing out on anything,” assures the rider, who as she has slowed down a bit, focusing more on the Dakar rally – which is held in January – has been able to make a little more of the summer days to “join family and friends’ plans”.

Beyond the tourist market of Encants in Plaça de les Glòries or the already historic Camello in Portaferrissa, Catalonia is full of small and large fairs of antique dealers, opportunities and collectibles to visit this summer throughout the most diverse towns on the coast and inland, with special abundance in the towns of Girona, and to vary a little from the (also) routine of looking for a spot on the beach for the umbrella and towel. These types of fairs are, moreover, spaces for discovering treasures: antique plates, historical photographs that could well inspire a novel or chandeliers of the kind not sold at Ikea are some of their great attractions. They also bring the pleasure of haggling in the heart of 21st century Catalonia, exchanging trading cards, looking for old typewriters, accordion cameras, postcards of the first Coca-Cola ads, iconic siphons or Playmobil figures and enjoying the satisfaction and good prices of second-hand items, which also contribute to the circular economy. In Catalonia there are true marchés aux puces to choose from, like the most ambitious ones in France or the rastros most emblematic of the late last century where you can waste time rummaging until you find a unique and singular treasure at a bargain price.

Until the 2010s, Fermí Casado was primarily an actor recognized for his work in series such as Estació d'enllaç, Mar de fons, and El cor de la ciutat. He rose to fame by playing the character of Tomàs, the fictional son of Àngels Poch and Josep Maria Pou in that popular TV3 fiction set in a Barcelona train station. From then on, Casado continued to string together theater performances and television projects, through which he built a solid acting career alongside directors such as Mario Gas, Sergi Belbel, Joan Lluís Bozzo, and Roser Batalla.

Torroella de Montgrí is the favorite place in Catalonia of Antònia Carré-Pons, an eclectic reader, editor, writer, winner of the Òmnium prize for best novel of 2025 for La gran família, and founder of the Cal Carré publishing house, which publishes medieval, modern, and contemporary classics. Antònia maintains the theory that nature is a state of mind, depending on how your soul is, it is valued in one way or another, therefore, it's not just beauty that counts, what makes the difference is the people who accompany you and how you feel with them.  For more than twenty years, he has spent a few days at the home of some friends in Torroella de Montgrí, “where you have one foot in the middle of nowhere and the other in civilization,” he states. He had been to the town a few times before, but going there assiduously has allowed him to make it his own. He explains that it is a town that, despite being a summer resort, retains its soul because it has a cinema, the Vila Casas Foundation, the Pere Blasi library, a bookstore as fantastic as El Cucut, and many shops: “These are places that accompany you and allow you not to be absolutely isolated or to be without seeing anyone.” There is also Montgrí Castle, the hermitage of Santa Caterina, where Víctor Català was inspired to write Solitud, and nearby the Foixà forest, where King John I died in 1398 after falling from his horse during a hunt.Torroella is liked even before arriving, when from the road you can already see the silhouette of Montgrí welcoming you. The days spent in Torroella are used to go to the beach, take a little walk, visit surrounding villages and above all to stay at home: “It has an extraordinary courtyard with shade where we chat, which is one of the most pleasant things to do, chatting with nice people, no heated discussions”. In summer, he stays there for about ten days, but he also goes at other times throughout the year. He admits that in winter it gains intensity, both the house, where it is colder and gives off warmth, and the town, which is more authentic without summer visitors. It is gratifying to walk down the street, where even if people don't know each other, they greet each other: “Nothing to do with summer, when it's full of tourists in shorts, who bother me a bit. We should limit tourism, they are eating up our country,” he proposes. She loves Pals beach, which is very long and from where the Medes Islands can be seen: “A free beach where nudists and non-nudists coexist, and where there are practically no people. I go first thing in the morning, move away from the houses and walk through the dunes until I decide where to set up my umbrella”. She finds it a magical landscape, from where she contemplates the immensity of the sea, nothingness, combined with the Medes, a generous nature, “two antithetical but complementary elements, and if you're lucky, every now and then you see a boat go by”.

Years ago, houses used to be the most common refuges to protect oneself from the heat. Far are those times when grandma would prepare you a cold infusion of water with mint or place a bucket of ice in front of the fan as home remedies when you came back all sweaty from playing in the neighborhood square. Today the situation is quite the opposite. Now these home recipes fall rather short in the face of premature and record-breaking summers that force us to seek refuges everywhere. Before summer arrives, children and the elderly fill the squares, libraries, and neighborhood centers to try to alleviate the stifling heat. The idyllic postcard of a neighborhood network contrasts with the image of sweaty neighbors leaning between the bars and ledges of windows, especially in the poorest neighborhoods of Catalonia, where nearly 30% of vulnerable people cannot afford air conditioning. Inequalities are increasing, and the capacity of certain sectors of society to cope with heatwaves is becoming increasingly limited.

For Dídac Romagós, the alma mater of Ràdio Vilablareix, there are three ingredients that make a summer night unforgettable: “Being surrounded by the people I love, having health, and having peace of mind”. “I am a simple person, and as I get older, I become even more so. Our problems always come from wanting more,” reflects Romagós. In summer, he says, people allow themselves a break and “it is then that we become more aware of living”. “We live too busy lives, and many times it is in these moments of rest, of idleness and observation, when great ideas appear,” he asserts.