Purificacion

Hola,

My friend and I are going to Spain on May 28, and will spend about 12 days there. We had been tied up by work lately, as we end up having 1 week to work on our itinerary - kinda rush when seeing others on this web are rather well-planned.

We both are gals of our early 30s, we haven't been Spain before, we are greedy to see and do almost everything there, contradictorily we would like to enjoy Espana slowly and do not want it rush as the package tour.

The place/cities we would like to visit are Madrid, Barcelona, Valencia, Seville, Toledo, (Mijas or Carmona or Osuna). ..(yeah too greedy!!!) Target to land on Madrid from HK, then finish up the journey and return to HK from Bacelona.

Here are my SOS questions, please help:

1) Is it possible to visit all the places within 12 days? If not, which cities I should opt out?

2) How many days should I spend on those cities individually?

3) We won't drive in Spain, thinking to take buses or trains from cities to cities, will it be too time consuming? Heard that the price of the train ticket may be same as the cost for taking the flight in some locations. Any suggestion though we don't want to spend too much on the flights?

4) I'm attracted by the whole range of white houses, target to see this white scenery by going to either Mijas, Carmona or Osuna. I personally like Mijas as it would be warmer and more sunny there, but it seems a bit far out from the cities that I will visit. Will Osuna or Carmona be the better substitute in my case?

5)Will Osuna or Carmona be still little cold now? As I expect to have the sunbath under the warm sun. That's the reason I prefer Mijas.

Your advice is much appreciated!

Thanks for your help.

laclaire

That is a wide itin, but I think 12 days can make it happen.

for the day breakdown, I don't know what you want to see or do ("everything" is not very helpful), but I would not do less than 3 in both Madrid and Barcelona. Valencia is a great place and could use 2, as could Sevilla, leaving you one day each for Toledo and one of the other places you mentioned.

I love circuit travel, but as BCN is sort of out of the way I would do Madrid with a day trip to Toledo and one of the mentioned 3, then on to Sevilla, fly to Barcelona (vueling.com) then train it to Valencia, then back to Madrid.

Raydotman

I think your wish list is a bit too much for twelve days. If you can arrive in Barceleona, then fly to Madrid, take a train to Seville and then return from Malaga you might be better off. (I am sorry but I do not recognize the abbreviation HK) While in Madrid you could day trip to Toledo, from Seville you can visit Carmona and from the Malaga area you can easily get to Mijas. I would leave Valencia for another time. You can fly on Vueling from Barcelona to Madrid; take the AVE train to Seville and another train from Seville to Malaga.

Purificacion

Many thanks to laclaire and Raydotman for your great suggestion!

Oh..sorry Raydotman, I should had mentioned that HK was meant for Hong Kong.

Anyway, thanks for you both a lot!

NEDSIRELAND

Jun 4 is Pentecost Sunday: occasion for Andalucia's Feria del Campo and Romeria al Santuario de la Virgen del Rocio (western border of the Donana wildlife refuge in Huelva). It ends Jun 6. Buses & Trains Madrid-Sevilla will be running full Fri Jun 2 thru Jun 4 and coming back Jun 5 & 6.

In 2004, when I was in that region, people claimed there were a million participants: police estimate 650,000 people, all dressed in typical Andaluz walking, riding horseback or in pony carts: singing and dancing along the way.

12-days isn't much, but you should be able to spend a few days in Madrid (try a daytrip to Toledo or Segovia).

Purificacion

Hola NEDSIRELAND,

Thanks for that. I didn't find the Pentecost Sunday on my guidebooks, will chuck those guidebooks in bin then.

I may give up some places and be more concentrate on Madrid, and definitely go to Toledo or Segovia.

Muchas Gracias!

NEDSIRELAND

Guidebooks, in general, are a year or two out of date wen they go on sale. Very few will give dates for Easter, Semana Santa, Carnaval or Pentecost. Many of Spain's significant happenings are tied to those Church Calendar events, the dates of which vary from year to year.

Don't trash your guidebooks because they don't list Church Calendar-related events. They've got a lot of other good stuff in them.

For Pueblos Blancos, consider Arcos de la frontera or Ronda, the former as a daytrip from Sevilla.

Buses are generally most inexpensive mode of transportation; AVE Madrid-Sevilla is high! Vueling airlines has some inexpensive fares. http://www.vueling.es It's mostly a trade-off: flying gets you to your destination quickly, so you're not wasting one of your meager 12-days on a train or bus.

Purificacion

Yeah...won't trash those guidebooks as they are still useful in many ways.

Thanks for the info of Veuling, but they seem don't have the flights between Madrid and Seville managed. And many books recommended the AVE as a must try experience...not sure if it's partly because no other inexpensive airfare option.