Greekgazoo

Hello all,

we (3 brothers, ages 32, 29, 24) are heading to spain this september 14th. we are staying 14 days. as of right now, we have planned:

~ Madrid: 4 nights.
- 1/2 day trip to Toledo
- 1/2 day trip to Segovia

~ Sevilla: 4 nights
- 1/2 day trip to Cordoba

~ Andalusia town: 3 nights
- (struggling with where to stay during this part of our trip).
- we have narrowed it down to Cadiz, Arcos de la Frontera, Ronda and Jerez. ANY ADVICE??? we will be renting a car for ONLY these three days

~ Granada: 2 nights

~ Back to Madrid: 1 final night

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we have done a good bit of research to come up with what we have in our itinerary thus far for our 14 days. we feel that it is busy, but not undoable. now we are struggling with our base for our Andalusia town 3 days. yes it would be wonderful to stay on the coast (cadiz) but it would also be great to stay in the hill towns (arcos, ronda). we are torn. we will more than likely visit each of the towns mentioned, we just dont know where to make our base.

any advice would be WONDERFUL !!!!!!!

thanks!!

CathyM

In general I think this is a good itinerary - not too rushed really. The 1/2 day trips will in reality probably take up the entire day as Toledo, Segovia and Cordoba really do have plenty to keep you busy the entire day.

As for the 3 days.......this is a difficult choice.

First of all I don't think you'd realistically be able to base yourself in one of the 4 cities and visit all from the base city....Ronda is 2.5 hours one way from Cadiz....a long daytrip. If you were willing to skip Ronda you could base yourself in Cadiz (my personal favorite) and visit Jerez and Arcos as daytrips. You really wouldn't even need a car. Although I really love Ronda this is probably the best solution. Another alternative would be to spend 2 nights in Cadiz (or Jerez), then 1 night in Ronda. Although I hate 1-nighters it would give you the chance to see all 4. However, 2 nights in Cadiz trying to see Cadiz, Jerez and Arcos would be very rushed. Then you could also give up Arcos, base yourself in Cadiz 2 nights then Ronda for 1 night. I guess I'm saying you should probably adjust your 3 nights to visit 3 cities based on your preference and the logistics on how they fit.

BillJ

I am struggling with a similar itinerary for earlier in Sept. Will post a similar question in a few days after some more research. However, you might find this interesting, we have decided to take an early train to Seville from Madrid, get off the train in Cordoba, store luggage at the bus station across the street from the train station (there is no luggage storage facility at the train station), see Cordoba, then continue on to Seville late afternoon or early evening. That saves one day on the itinerary.
The key is whether or not there is luggage storage available at the bus station across the street, if not, heck, we just get back on the next train to Seville and do a day trip to Cordoba from there the next day.

CathyM

There are lockers at the bus station in Cordoba and usually there are open ones. I don't think this would shave a day off the trip though. It would just mean not having to "backtrack" for the daytrip. I'd budget a minimum of 3 full days in Sevilla. So, you'd arrive late day in Sevilla but still want to stay for 4 nights (which is just 3 full days). I don't think this would be the case but if for some reason you thought you'd seen enough of Sevilla after 2 full days then you could always do a daytrip (Carmona, Ecija, Osuna, Sanlucar, etc...). I'd err on the side of having too much time and the flexibility of adding a day trip versus an itinerary that's too rushed and can't be changed.

danon

One can easily see Segovia in several hours and Toledo in half a day. What takes time is getting to train station(s) in Madrid, getting from the station to center of town(s) and repeating the same on the way back.

kja

Sounds like a nice trip!

As for your day trips, how long they take will depends on what you want to see and experience. Many people do spend just a few hours in Segovia, Toledo, and Cordoba, but I spent a full day in Segovia and 2 full days each in Toledo and Cordoba and didn't run out of things to see. You might want to approach these visits with the idea that they could take longer than 1/2 day, or, if you really want only 1/2 day trips, think out your priorities beforehand and do take into account the time to get there and back.

yorkshire

Cadiz or Ronda--see Jerez and Arcos as day trips if you wanna, but Cadiz and Ronda blow both out of the water imo.
Cadiz if you want coastal flavor (you can do lots of day trips without a car), and Ronda if you want more mountain flavor. In that case I would drive to Grazalema area for some hiking. Or, if you can squeeze a night off somewhere else, stay in Cadiz 2 nights and Ronda 2 nights, see Jerez on way from Sevilla and Arcos on way to Ronda.

kimhe

This looks like a great plan!

When in Sevilla, you might want to go to a concert at the world's most important flamenco festival, the Bienal de flamenco. Celebrated between the 15th of September and the 9th of October. One of the finest dancers in the world today, according to The New York Times, the 25 year old Rocío Molina is performing at the grand Teatro de la Maestranza on the 19th.
http://www.flamenco-world.com/notici...al22032010.htm

I would strongly recommend Michael Jacobs' excellent "Andalucía" as pre-journey reading. Going before and after having read this book is two different worlds. Jacobs also gives informed opinions on a wide range of cities and villages that should help you decide where to go after Sevilla. http://www.amazon.co.uk/Andalucia-Pa.../dp/1873429789

In Madrid, I wouldn't miss out on a night at the fabolous jazz venue Café Central at Plaza del Angel 10, just off Plaza de Santa Ana. Concerts every night at 10 with top artists and awesome atmosphere.

And perhaps go for lunch at the sixth-floor terrace in Casa Granada, close to vibrant Plaza Tirso de Molina:
http://www.tripfilms.com/Travel_Vide...ada-Video.html

Or have some of the tastiest garlic chicken in town at El Ventorillo in the Vistillas park. Arguably the best views of the sunset over the Guadarrama mountain range north-west of the city. http://11870.com/pro/restaurante-ventorrillo

lifelist

Just got back from a 2-week trip to Spain. Segovia was about 2/3 of a day. I took an early train (8:45 a.m., IIRC) and was ready to head back around 2 p.m. I had enough time to check out the aqueduct, walk over to the cathedral and do a walk through, check out the fort, and then walk back to the aqueduct, where I had suckling pig at Candido's for lunch. I pretty much hit all of the main tourist spots in about 4 hours.

Toledo was pretty much the same, though it's a good town to wander about in, so you can easily spend more time.

Both towns are a bunch of walking, so I wouldn't schedule too much on the same day as those trips. (e.g. I wouldn't expect to do Toledo as a 1/2 day trip, and get back to Madrid and then do the Prado the same day.)

I do think you save some time by visiting Cordoba as a stopover on a train ride between Madrid and Seville. If you do Cordoba as a day trip out of Seville, then you gotta spend the 1 hour round trip on the train, and then 1-2 hours getting to and waiting around at the train station.

Greekgazoo

Everyone, awesome responses. thank you so much as always.

we are still torn between cadiz and ronda b/c we wanna do both, but we really dont know how to fit them both in, unless we choose to stay overnight at cadiz for two days and then stay at ronda for one day (since they arent necessarily close to one another.)

so we booked our hotels in madrid and sevilla (4 nights each).

we were actually just thinking, to rent a car from sevilla when we are ready to leave (we will only have the car for 3 full days), drive to cadiz, stay here for two nights, pack up, drive to ronda and spend one day here, and then drive to granada where we will stay for two days. on our way from cadiz to granada, we might as well just stay in ronda overnight since we will pretty much be going through that area anyway. so when we are in cadiz, we will visit jerez and arcos one day, and just stay in cadiz area for the 2nd day. i think this should work out.

does anyone know how long it takes to drive from:

Sevilla to Cadiz?

Cadiz to arcos?

Cadiz to ronda?

ronda to granada?

CathyM

I think this is a good plan although I think it will be a little rushed trying to visit Jerez and Arcos in one day. But with a car you'll have the flexibility to change your mind. I've made the mistake in the past of having the mentality I absolutely have to stick with my original itinerary - when on a particular day I really didn't feel like doing as much as I planned. In retrospect I should have winged it and let something go on those days I just felt like having a more relaxed pace.

I think michelin probably has the best directions, along with time alloted for driving. I used to use mapquest for driving directions in Spain and had 2 very bad experiences with their recommendations. Maribel pointed me to michelin....

http://www.viamichelin.co.uk/tpl/hme/MaHomePage.htm

yorkshire

Like CathyM says, leave your options open. Arcos is tiny--you can see it on the way to Ronda. Likewise, Jerez on the way to Cadiz. When you have the car, you might want to concentrate on seeing tiny places that are not accessible otherwise.
Pick up a Rough Guide to Andalucia.

BillJ

CathyM, thank you for that link to ViaMichelin. It has helped immensely. Yes, I too have been disappointed with Mapquest directions.
I am following this thread because I have very similar itinerary (on another thread), and this has been informative.
I am going to try the Cordoba stop on the way to Seville. If it works (luggage storage at the bus stop?) we'll have two full days in Seville, much more relaxed I think.