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2 twenty something lovebirds doing spain and portugal for 3 weeks in July
Hi! I have used fodor's to plan trips in the past and LOVE all the great advice I have gotten. Now I am on official Fodorite too!
I am having some trouble planning part of my trip to Spain for July 2007. I love to travel and want to try to see as much as I can in the short time I have. Here's what I have so far: Arrive in Madrid in the morning from Canada. Spend 2 days in Madrid. Fly to Bilbao to check out the gugenheim. Go to Pamplona for the running of the bulls - this is the only day I could get a hotel room, so this has impacted the planning a bit. Go to San Sebastian to recover - we have a day and a half of beach time. Off to Barcelona for 3 or 4 days - can't decide. I have been to Barcelona before and absolutly love it! My partner has never been to Europe before. We want to fly next to Seville and spend a week doing Southern Spain - Seville, Cordoba, Granada, Rhoda, Malaga, Marbella, and we both want to check out Gibraltar if possible. We are planning on renting a car for this part of the trip because we want to travel around a lot and don't want to have to rely on bus schedules. We were thinking of possibly staying in one or two places and doing mostly day trips, but now we are unsure of where we should base ourselves. My partner wants to fit in a wine tour, but I'm not sure the best place to do this in July. We have to eventually end up in Lisbon to fly back to Canada and we wanted to spend the last 4 or 5 days in southern Portugal to spend our last few days relaxing (and I'm hoping to get a surfing lesson in). So, I have about 7 or 8 days to work with and too many places to see! We have found some accomodations, but would also welcome any tips about where to stay. we are looking for mid-priced hotels (around $100 - $150 dollars) - just looking for good value. Please help! Any recommendations would be really helpful. THANK YOU!! |
For southern Spain, I suggest you a trip to Ubeda, Baeza and Sierra de Cazorla.
The official website for tourism in Spain is: www.Spain.info/TourSpain Click english and search the tips. |
Hi, rsn - what a whirlwind tour.
A few suggestions: give yourselves a chance to recover from teh flight and extend your stay in Madrid - if you get bored, you could take day trips to toledo and/or segovia. Then spend your night in Pamplona, followed by Bilbao or San Seb. [or cut them out entirely and spend longer in Barcellona]. This would be the time to fit in a wine tour of the rioja area. That lot should take about half the trip. Then in Andalucia, have a look at a map and work out a round tour - the Cadogan guide to Andalucia is very good on this. For romance, the alhambra is hard to beat, especially at night - 2 nights in Granada will probably be enough and you must book your tickets in advance. Unless you have some really good reason for going there, like family connections, I wouldn't bother with Gibraltar - time better spent in Jerez and Cadiz, IMO. good luck! |
Thank you so much for your good advice!
We have decided to stay for an extra day in Madrid (we now have 3 days) and fly directly to Pamploma - we have taken Bilbao out of the itinerary so it will be less rushed. We have also decided on 4 days in Barcelona - with one being devoted to a wine tour. We have been looking into some tours, but haven't found one just yet. In terms of our travels in southern spain: we have decided to fly from barcelona to seville and pick up a car in seville. We have also taken out Gibraltar in favour of an extra day in Seville. Here's what we have so far: day 1 - seville day 2 - seville day 3 -- drive to cordoba and spend the night day 4 - drive to granada, spend the day in granada, stay overnight day 5 - go to the alhambra, drive to malaga day 6 - wake up early and walk around malaga, drive to marbella and back to seville. return car in seville day 7 - wake up early and take the bus to Faro, Portugal This leaves us with a day in Faro, 2 days in Lagos, a day and a half in Lisbon and then we fly home. I know it is a bit rushed, but there are just so many places to see! Do you think this is enough time/too much time in each place? Keep in mind that we have the last few days in Portugal to relax, go to the beach, take a surfing lesson, etc. Also, I am having trouble finding a reasonably priced hotel for san sebastian - any suggestions?? THANK YOU!! |
Hi, rsn -
glad you decided to extend your stay in Madrid - we just spent 3 days there and it will be a great place to recover from jet-lag as you can get virtually anything you might want to eat [or drink] at any time of the day, or nighht. I'm in the middle of a trip report if you want to click on my name for further details. Your new itinerary looks great. Sorry I can't help with lodgings in SS - one and only time we went was over 20 years ago, and all I can remember is the huge thinder-storm that hit while we were there. I do remember what a lovely place it was, though. Good luck Ann |
Hi, again,
forgot to say that you should go to the alhambra at night [the most romtantic experience, ever!] and during the day. This really isn't overkill as at night you can enjoy a walk throguh the gardens and the palaces with their beautiful decorations; during the day you get all the buildings plus the generalife. Your new itinerary should allow for this, but you must book in advance. Regards, ann |
I think your plans for the part of your trip in Spain sound great, and I second annhig's recommendation to see the Alhambra at night (and to book ahead for that) - magical! Enjoy!
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Thank you so much for all your help! I'm happy with the revised itinerary.
I am looking forward to seeing the alhambra - how far in advance should we arrange tickets? Also - has anyone done a winery tour near barcelona? We have heard from a few people that it's a good thing to do, but we haven't yet found a tour that we're crazy about (and moderately priced). Any suggestions? |
Hi, rsn,
ref. Alhambra tickets, as you are going in July, i would say book now [or as soon as you can for your dates - my recollection is that you can book pretty far ahead, but there may be a "booking period"]. The time slot referred to on the web-site refers to the 30 monutes during which you may enter the nasrid palaces - the rest of the site is not timed at all. The system is a bit confusing - if you book a morning time slot, you can enter as early as you like and stay all day. If you book what they call an "afternoon" slot, you can't enter the site before 2pm. Remeber there is ateh generalife to see in teh day as well - it's agood 4-5 hours to do it all. For July, I'd want to be there early in the morning, then be able to leave when it gets too hot. For the evening visit, only the gardens and the palaces are open - you can enter the site when you like, but have to wait to enter the palaces during your 30 mniute time slot. It is supremely romantic wandering around the gardens at night, so that's not much of a problem! good luck! regards, ann |
sorry about the typos - I'm rushing this before I go to work!
regards, ann |
Thanks Ann! You have been so much help! If you think of anything else - please send me a message!
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hi, rsn,
glad to be of help. If you want to read about our recent weekend in Madrid, you'll find my trip report [uncompleted but I'm getting there] if you click on my screen name, or search annhig madrid. do you need hotel recommendations? i can only help with Madrid, Granada and Malaga I'm afraid. Have you found Maribel's guides yet? as well as being a Fodor stalwart, she's got her own web-site with very detailed guides to lots of spain. they are well worth a read. best wishes, ann |
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Thanks again Ann! I have checked out your trip report from Madrid - sounds like you guys had a great time!
For hotels in Madrid - we haven't yet booked, but were looking into the Room Mate Mario which has been recommended on this site. I think, however, that we might go with hostal acapulco instead - only b/c it is much cheaper and I know that we will be rushing around Madrid and not spending time in the hotel. We are still looking into hotels in Cordoba and Granada: Granada - we are looking into Ladron de Agua, Casa Federico, Casa Morisca... All of these come highly recommended on tripadvisor - have you heard of them? We aren't really sure about Cordoba yet - this trip is a real work in progress... do you have anywhere to recommend? (we are looking for places that are moderately priced - max. about $100US - but we are saving money on other places so we don't mind paying a bit extra for something really nice. |
Hi, rsn,
Thansk for the kind words; still trying to finish the trip report, as you'll see. In Madrid, I only have experience of hee hotel opera - if anything I found there was too much choice, but i would avoid anything which fronted onto a main street - those madrillenos are just too noisy! In Granada, we stayed in the Hotel Guadelupe - right opposite the alhambra - in a large double room with full bathroom for E60. Parking is in the large car park opposite with a discount as a hotel resident. There is a very regular bus down into the town from right outside the alhambra but it's a nice 10 minute walk downhill; the bus back [a 20 minute walk back uphill so much more important] goes very regualarly from the main square at the bottom of the hill. about 1E each way. hope this helps, regards, ann |
I am wondering why you do not consider flying into Barcelona and from there move onto Pamplona and San Sebastian. You might be able fit La Rioja in here.
Then go south to Madrid and from there, train to Sevilla and the rest of your Andalucian plans. I am not sure about the winery in the south, as they are less known for their wines than other regions. Any interest in sherry? Do you actually want to see how the wines are made or just sample lots of wines from various regions? |
We looked into a number of different flights, but the one into Madrid was the best choice for us. Because of other circumstances, we had no flexbility on dates, so that limited our flight options somewhat. And we actually booked our flights last week - so we can't change that part of the trip...
In terms of a wine tour - we are very open to trying new things. We had heard from a few people that there is a nice region near barcelona, and that's why we started looking into it. Just thought it would be something fun to do! Any suggestions for something that would be better? |
For wine tours check:
www.vintagespain.com |
Thank you all for all of your help! We have decided to make a small change in the itinerary - what are your thoughts?
Instead of flying from Barcelona into seville (as in the above itinerary) we were thinking of flying into Malaga: July 17 - fly into Malaga - drive through Malaga, Marbella, Rhonda - sleep in either Malaga or Marbella. Thoughts? July 18 -- Granada July 19 - Granada July 20 -- Cordoba July 21 - seville July 22 - Seville We now have an extra day somewhere in that week. We were thinking of either spending the day and going to Jerez de la Fronera. Or, we could leave Seville and go to Faro, Portugal before heading to Lagos on the 24th. Or we could do something else! What do you think? We could use some help!! |
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