Learn Hardcore Spanish (Spain): Quiero un paseo guiado por el centro urbano. - I want a guided walk through the city center.

Quiero literally means I want, so it can sound quite direct. In Spanish, especially in Spain, this is often perfectly acceptable in casual situations:

Quiero un paseo guiado por el centro urbano.
= I want a guided tour through the town/city centre.

If you want to sound more polite or tentative (for example when speaking to staff), it’s more common to use:

Me gustaría un paseo guiado por el centro urbano.
= I would like a guided tour…
Quisiera un paseo guiado por el centro urbano.
= I would like a guided tour… (a bit more formal or soft)

So your sentence is grammatically correct; the nuance is just direct vs more polite.

Why don’t we say yo quiero? Where did yo go?

In Spanish the subject pronoun is usually omitted because the verb ending already shows who the subject is.

Quiero already tells us I want (first person singular).
Yo quiero is not wrong, but it’s only used when you want to emphasize I, e.g. to contrast:
- Yo quiero un paseo guiado, pero él quiere ir solo.
  I want a guided walk, but he wants to go alone.

So Quiero un paseo guiado… is the normal, neutral form.

Why is it un paseo guiado and not una paseo guiado?

Spanish nouns have grammatical gender.

paseo is a masculine noun.
Masculine singular nouns normally take un (a/an) and el (the):
- un paseo = a walk
- el paseo = the walk

So:

un paseo guiado = a guided walk / guided tour (on foot)

If the noun were feminine, you’d use una instead:

una visita guiada = a guided visit / guided tour

What exactly does paseo mean here? Is it always on foot?

Paseo basically means walk or stroll, usually on foot. In many contexts:

dar un paseo = to go for a walk / stroll

In tourist contexts, un paseo guiado will normally be understood as a guided walk, on foot, around an area.

However, paseo can be combined with a vehicle too:

un paseo en barco = a boat trip
un paseo en coche = a car ride

For a more standard term for tourist tours (not necessarily on foot), Spanish often uses:

una visita guiada = a guided tour / guided visit

Why is it un paseo guiado and not un guiado paseo?

In Spanish, adjectives normally come after the noun:

English: a guided tour
Spanish: un tour guiado or un paseo guiado

Putting the adjective before the noun is possible in some cases, but it changes the nuance, is poetic, or just sounds wrong with certain words. Un guiado paseo sounds unnatural.

So the natural order is:

paseo guiado, visita guiada, tour guiado

Could I say una visita guiada instead of un paseo guiado? Is there a difference?

Yes, you can say:

Quiero una visita guiada por el centro urbano.

This is actually more common in many tourism contexts.

Difference in nuance:

paseo guiado: emphasizes the idea of a walk / stroll (on foot, moving around).
visita guiada: more general guided visit / guided tour; can be walking around a city, or inside a museum, monument, etc.

Both are correct; visita guiada is a very standard expression in Spain for an organized tour.

Why is the preposition por used here? Could I use en or al instead?

In this context:

por el centro urbano means through / around / around in the city centre. It focuses on movement within or through an area.

Alternatives:

en el centro urbano = in the city centre
More static; it doesn’t emphasize moving around as much:
- Quiero un paseo guiado en el centro urbano.
  I want a guided walk (that takes place) in the city centre.
al centro urbano = to the city centre
This focuses on destination, not moving around inside:
- Quiero ir al centro urbano.
  I want to go to the city centre.

So por is the most natural choice to mean around/through the city centre during the walk.

Why is it por el centro urbano and not just por centro urbano?

In Spanish, when talking about a specific place in this kind of context, you normally include the definite article el / la / los / las.

el centro urbano = the city centre / the urban centre

Without the article (por centro urbano) sounds ungrammatical here. You would only drop the article in some fixed expressions or when the noun is being used more abstractly, which is not the case here.

What exactly does centro urbano mean? Is it the same as centro de la ciudad or casco antiguo?

Centro urbano literally means urban centre and is often equivalent to city/town centre. But there are some nuances:

el centro urbano / el centro
General centre of the city/town, including shops, main streets, etc.
el centro de la ciudad
Very similar meaning; a bit more explicit.
el casco antiguo / casco histórico
The old town / historic centre, the oldest part with historical buildings.

Your sentence:

…por el centro urbano
suggests a guided walk around the main urban centre (not necessarily only the historical part).

In everyday speech in Spain, people often just say:

por el centro = through the centre (very common)

Could I just say Quiero un paseo guiado por el centro? Is urbano necessary?

Yes, you can absolutely say:

Quiero un paseo guiado por el centro.

In everyday conversation in Spain, el centro is very common and usually understood as the city/town centre, especially if you’re already talking about that town.

Adding urbano makes it a bit more formal or technical, and might appear more in written information (e.g., brochures, official descriptions).

Why don’t we say Quiero hacer un paseo guiado?

Spanish verbs pair with nouns in specific ways, and not all combinations that work in English work in Spanish.

Typical pairings:

dar un paseo = to go for a walk / to take a walk
hacer una visita guiada = to do a guided tour/visit

So you would normally say:

Quiero dar un paseo por el centro urbano.
(no guide necessarily implied)
Quiero hacer una visita guiada por el centro urbano.
= I want to do a guided tour through the city centre.

Hacer un paseo sounds unnatural; paseo goes with dar, while visita guiada goes well with hacer.

How is guiado pronounced? Is the u sounded?

Guiado is pronounced roughly like gya-DO in Spain.

The g before ui is a hard g (like in go).
The u is not pronounced as a separate vowel; it just makes the g hard.
So it’s not goo-ee-a-do, but closer to gya-do: [ɡjaˈðo] in IPA for standard Peninsular Spanish.

Syllables: gui-a-do, but the u is silent.