h0b0

Again, thank you so much everybody! There's too much here for me to give specific thanks but I assure you I'm digesting every bit of information you've given me here! I'm making some adjustments in my itinerary now. I love being at the stage where the "big picture" is set and I can tinker with the details.
I'm very grateful and look forward to reading more.

In addition to looking into Granada hotels, I'm thinking of adding a day in Provence and subtracting one from Barcelona. It's not that I don't want to spend lots of time in Barcelona, but I'm thinking that there might be too much "big city" time and that we might wish we'd had more time to putter around outside of Avignon. Also wondering if staying right IN Avignon is the best choice...

rambling here... but thanks again!

julia_t

Just want to say you'll never do all that on Day 10 in Barcelona.

Parc Guell is good for kids, but is not particularly central so allow around 3 hours for that. Spanish Village - okay for lunch but not actually that interesting, so you could skip that. Picasso Museum is great for children because they tend to be fascinated by the apparent simplicity of his work. My then 12 yo daughter was absolutely fascinated by Picasso's seemingly endless copies of Velasquez's Las Meninas. With queues to get in, and even not seeing everything you need to allow 2-3 hours.

Picasso Museum is close to the Cathedral (5 minutes walk) and Las Ramblas (10 Minutes walk), but expect it to take you around 1 hour to get from Parc Guell to Barri Gotic area even using the metro because you have to change metro, and walk at each end, especially up the hill at the Parc Guell end.

Las Ramblas can take you a few minutes to walk, or several hours, depending on what time of day (best to go in the morning when La Bocqueria is open) and how often you stop for refreshment!

But have a great trip anyway.

zwho

I would heed everyones advice to you especially concerning Paris and Barcelona. Just with normal waits for traffic and lines for getting in to places, you have to cut down on sites to visit per day. My davice is to not drive to Ronda in the evening. Its like an hour and a half mountain pass ride and scary enough in daylight.

h0b0

Again, thank you for eveybody's comments! We've made some adjustments - adding a day in Provence, one less in Barcelona (will just see a couple of highlights in Barcelona).

We'll also now stay at the Parador at the Alhambra in Granada instead of Jaen to cut down on the driving that day and to give us the opportunity for the night tour of the Alhambra.

Our afternoon drive to Ronda is still on - I'm sure it'll be an adventure!

StCirq

About the slow train to Avignon - no way it's more fun than the TGV, it's just slower and makes more stops. You can probably get a better ticket price on the TGV anyway.

h0b0

Thanks St Cirque... I appreciate the input!