Essential Spanish travel phrases, in the order a trip spends them

If you want the short answer, here are the ten that carry a week in Spain, in the order a trip spends them: perdón (per-DON, excuse me), ¿habla inglés? (AH-bla een-GLESS), ¿dónde está la parada de taxis? (DON-deh es-TAH la pa-RA-da deh TAK-sees), a esta dirección, por favor (ah ES-ta dee-rek-SYON por fa-BOR), ¿cuánto cuesta? (KWAN-to KWES-ta), tengo una reserva a nombre de (TEN-go OO-na reh-SEHR-ba a NOM-breh deh), una mesa para dos (OO-na MEH-sa PA-ra dos), ¿qué me recomienda? (keh meh reh-ko-MYEN-da), la cuenta, por favor (la KWEN-ta por fa-BOR), ¿tiene algo para el dolor de cabeza? (TYEH-neh AL-go PA-ra el do-LOR deh ka-BEH-tha).

The order is the useful part. Alphabetical lists and category lists put la biblioteca near the front and the taxi rank somewhere near the back, which is the reverse of how a trip works. Your first ninety minutes on the ground spend more Spanish out loud than the next three days combined, because that is when you are asking strangers for things under time pressure with luggage in one hand. So the list below follows the arc: airport, taxi, hotel desk, restaurant, shop and pharmacy. Learn it in that sequence and the phrases arrive in your mouth roughly when you need them.

Three pronunciation rules that do most of the work

Before the phrases, the sounds. Spanish rewards this more than most languages, because the spelling is close to honest and there are only five vowel sounds.

• Stress. Words ending in a vowel, n or s take the stress on the second-to-last syllable: cuen-ta, me-sa, re-ser-va. Anything else takes it on the last: ho-tel, se-ñor. A written accent overrides both and tells you exactly where to push: estación, perdón, dónde.
• The Spanish lisp, which is not a lisp. In most of mainland Spain, c before e or i and the letter z are a soft th, as in thin. So cerveza is thehr-BEH-tha and gracias is GRA-thias. In Latin America, the Canaries and much of Andalusia the same letters are a plain s. Pick the one that matches your destination and stay there. Mixing them is the thing that sounds odd.
• Vowels stay put. A is ah, e is eh, i is ee, o is oh, u is oo, every time, with no glide at the end. English speakers tend to let o drift towards "ow". Keep it short and the whole phrase lands better than a wider vocabulary would.

The rest is quick. LL is a y, ñ is ny, h is silent, j is a throaty h, and a single r between vowels is one light tap of the tongue, not a roll. Nobody will stop you over the roll.

The airport, minutes one to forty

You need less than you think here, because signage does the heavy lifting and the questions put to you are closed.

• Perdón (per-DON) or disculpe (dees-KOOL-peh) to open. Use disculpe with staff, perdón when you have already bumped someone.
• No hablo español, ¿habla inglés? (no AH-blo es-pa-NYOL, AH-bla een-GLESS). Say the first half anyway. It buys goodwill that "do you speak English" alone does not.
• ¿Dónde está la salida? (DON-deh es-TAH la sa-LEE-da), the way out. Swap in el baño (el BA-nyo), la parada de taxis, la estación (la es-ta-THION).
• Vengo de vacaciones (BEN-go deh ba-ka-THIO-nes), I am here on holiday, for the one question at passport control that wants a sentence.

What comes back at you: ¿algo que declarar? (AL-go keh deh-kla-RAR), pase (PA-seh, go through), and siguiente (see-GYEN-teh, next). That last one is shouted at queues everywhere in Spain and knowing it saves you ten seconds of looking lost.

The taxi rank

This is where a phrase saves real money, so it earns its place high in the ranking.

• A esta dirección, por favor (ah ES-ta dee-rek-SYON por fa-BOR), while showing the screen. The address written down beats the address pronounced.
• ¿Cuánto cuesta hasta el centro? (KWAN-to KWES-ta AS-ta el THEN-tro).
• ¿Es tarifa fija? (es ta-REE-fa FEE-ha), is it a fixed fare. Worth asking because in several Spanish cities it genuinely is. Madrid's council sets a single flat airport fare of 33 euros for journeys between Adolfo Suárez-Barajas and anywhere inside the M-30 ring, with no supplements added on top, which is a number you can say out loud in the cab and be right about.
• Pare aquí, por favor (PA-reh a-KEE por fa-BOR), stop here.
• ¿Puedo pagar con tarjeta? (PWEH-do pa-GAR kon tar-HEH-ta), and el recibo, por favor (el reh-THEE-bo).

Expect ¿por autopista? (por ow-to-PEES-ta), meaning shall I take the toll road. Your answers are sí or la más corta, por favor (la mas KOR-ta).

The hotel desk, before your room is ready

• Tengo una reserva a nombre de (TEN-go OO-na reh-SEHR-ba a NOM-breh deh), then your surname, slowly.
• ¿Puedo dejar las maletas? (PWEH-do deh-HAR las ma-LEH-tas), can I leave my bags. This is the single most useful sentence of day one, because check-in in Spain often is not until mid-afternoon and the alternative is dragging a case around a city you have not learned yet.
• ¿A qué hora es el desayuno? (a keh O-ra es el deh-sa-YOO-no).
• No funciona el aire (no foon-THIO-na el AI-reh), the air conditioning is not working. No funciona plus a noun covers the shower, the key card and the lift.

You will hear ¿me deja su pasaporte? (meh DEH-ha soo pa-sa-POR-teh) and la habitación no está lista hasta las tres (la a-bee-ta-THION no es-TA LEES-ta AS-ta las tres).

The restaurant, the phrases you will spend most often

• Una mesa para dos, por favor (OO-na MEH-sa PA-ra dos).
• ¿Qué me recomienda? (keh meh reh-ko-MYEN-da), what do you recommend. It opens a conversation you can mostly nod through, and it tends to get you fed better.
• Para mí, esto (PA-ra mee, ES-to), this one for me, with a finger on the menu. Not elegant, entirely effective.
• Soy alérgico a (soy a-LEHR-hee-ko a), or alérgica if you are a woman, then los frutos secos (nuts), el marisco (shellfish), el gluten, los lácteos (dairy). If a reaction of yours is serious, treat the spoken line as the opener and carry a properly translated written card as well, rather than relying on a practised sentence in a loud dining room.
• La cuenta, por favor (la KWEN-ta por fa-BOR). Catching an eye and miming a scribble works too, and in Spain nobody finds it rude.
• ¿Está incluido el servicio? (es-TA een-kloo-EE-do el ser-BEE-thio). Tipping in Spain is not generally treated as obligatory and is tied to the service you got, so this question is about information, not about calculating a percentage.

The replies are a tight set: ¿para beber? (PA-ra beh-BEHR), ¿algo más? (AL-go mas), ¿juntos o separados? (HOON-tos o seh-pa-RA-dos), together or separately.

The pharmacy, and the one you hope stays unused

Spanish pharmacies handle a lot of what a traveller would otherwise take to a clinic, and the green cross is open late on a rota known as the farmacia de guardia (far-MA-thia deh GWAR-dia), the duty pharmacy.

• ¿Tiene algo para...? (TYEH-neh AL-go PA-ra), do you have something for, then el dolor de cabeza (headache), el dolor de garganta (throat), las ampollas (blisters), las picaduras (bites).
• Me duele aquí (meh DWEH-leh a-KEE), it hurts here, with a hand on the place. Two words and a gesture outperform a sentence you half remember.
• ¿Necesito receta? (neh-theh-SEE-to reh-THEH-ta), do I need a prescription.
• ¿Cuál es la farmacia de guardia? (kwal es la far-MA-thia deh GWAR-dia).

For anything urgent, the number is 112, which is free to call from any phone anywhere in the European Union under the bloc's electronic communications rules. Phrases like llame a una ambulancia (YA-meh a OO-na am-boo-LAN-thia) are for general communication practice only and are not a substitute for calling local emergency services or asking for a qualified interpreter.

Getting them into your mouth, not your notes app

Thirty phrases read on a flight is thirty phrases forgotten by baggage reclaim. Say each one aloud until the stress lands in the right place without you thinking about it, and practise the four or five replies above as well, since the reply is where most people freeze. Front-load the airport and taxi lines, because you spend them cold with no chance to rehearse, and leave the restaurant set until later in the week when you have had three dinners to warm up on.

That ranking logic is exactly what Phrazl is built to do for you. When it launches, you pick your destination, your departure date and up to three scenarios from restaurant, transport, hotel, emergency and shopping, and it hands back a phrase set already ordered by trip relevance rather than by alphabet or by grammar chapter. The scheduler is a spaced repetition system compressed against your departure date as a hard deadline, so a trip three weeks out and a trip three days out get different review pacing. You practise in three modes: flashcards, listen and repeat with audio playback, and fill in the blank. There are no streaks and no points, just a single readiness bar that reports how much of the curriculum you have covered, and the emergency scenario carries its disclaimer on the selection screen. The first twenty phrases are free to try, which is enough to find out whether saying things out loud suits you better than the app you already abandoned.