Ok, maybe this will draw more responses....

I've to think about the following: Do I spend 2 nights in Granada and 1 in Seville, or 2 nights in Seville and 1 in Granada? I'd have thought that Seville is bigger and so deserves more time. What do you think?

All this because of the stupid sunset quandary here:

http://www.fodors.com/forums/pgMessa...p;tid=34530409

IMO Granada is the better place to stay if you need to spend an additional night. you can do it so that you take the train back to seville in order to catch the high speed train to madrid from there, giving a bit of extra time to see what you may have missed if you have the energy.

Thanks Wildfire -- could people also comment on the evening activities available in the two places? I need to read my guide books, obviously, but well, you guys can save me from reading them.

Hi,

Well, I preferred Sevilla, so I'd suggest 2 nights there. You can see a flamenco show, or hop from tapas bar to tapas bar eating and drinking.

Karen

Thanks karen -- I printed out your trip report. I enjoyed reading it very much but obviously need to read it more carefully for trip planning.

My vote would go to Seville as well, mostly because I'm a huge flamenco fan, but I also would recommend going to Alhambra at night (as well as in the day) if you can.

Any preferred flamenco venues?

Re Alhambra at night -- I think that I'll wait until I get there. Do you think that may be a problem? I've booked tickets for the day already, but the time is at 12:30, which I guess is ok.

I think that this should turn out to be pretty fun and interesting -- it was not at all a trip I had wanted to do, but somehow I ended up doing it. And I'll be doing fado (in Lisbon) and flamenco -- both of which I know nothing about. I expect my horizons to be broadened.

Depends on what you like to do at night. I personally was staying downtown by the Plaza Nueva. I did not get to see the Alhambra at night, but got to see one of the flamenco shows in the caves, which was quite good..from what i hear quite better than what was available in Seville.

There are some great little bars right nearby, an irish bar whose name i cannot recall was excellent,,,and Granada 10 disco (opens at midnite)

the two main areas for nightlife in seville were santa cruz (downtowm) and isla magica. good bar hopping in santa cruz, seemed like a lot of overpriced flamenco shows, lots of nice restaurants ..
hope this helps

Thanks Wildfire. I'll be with my mom, so probably something sedate. Maybe I can explore the other options once she sleeps. (Just kidding.)

perhaps seeing the alhambra by night would be a quite unforgettable thing for both of you. Granada is more sedate, less hurried, IMO

Los Gallos, in Seville, has a good Flamenco show.

granada definitely more serene at night than sevilla.

I loved the flamenco show at Los Gallos, and my Spanish teacher (who is from Seville) also thinks highly of it, but there are others as well that as supposed to be good as well.

As i didnt have as much time in Seville i passed up Los Gallos for flamenco, but i did do one of those evenings in Granada, the show with dinner in one of the places in the albaicin, very good.
More impressive really was the show we saw in Cordoba, twas a free flamenco show put on by the city govt.,i think by students from the flamenco school, but it was outstanding.

Thanks for all the suggestions -- for now, I think that I'll spend the additional night in Seville, as I found out that there's a flamenco festival going on (I think it's supposed to end on Oct. 10, but I've also seen pages that say it ends on Oct. 6 -- I hope it's really Oct. 10).

The website is at

www.bienal-flamenco.org/

but always seems to be down.

Anyway, if there're more comments, please air them. Thanks!

By the way, it looks like a schedule can be found here too:

http://www.exploreseville.com/events/bienalflamenco.htm

If there're flamenco experts that know about performers and whether some shows are better than others, please let me know -- I don't even know if there're tickets left....

I'm expecting to be in Seville during the nights of Oct. 7 and Oct. 8.

Thanks!