Train travel in Spain & Portugal
 

We are traveling to Spain and Portugal for Christmas. We fly in to Malaga (frequent flier miles in case you wonder why) and out of Lisbon. We would prefer to take trains if possible and have in many other areas of Europe - but it looks like it may be more limited in Southern Spain. Does anyone have any experience in this area?

Also we are considering taking the ferry over to Tangier for a day or two and wondered if it was worth it??

If anyone has any must have info on the Andalusia region of Spain or the Lisbon area of Portugal - or threads to prior posts, I'd be appreciative - we're planning this on very short notice.

First tell us how many days you will have.

Personally, I would forget the Tangier trip and wait until you can visit much more interesting parts of the country.

We arrive in Malaga on the 19th (around 12:00pm) and fly out of Portugal on the 29th (early in the am) - so realistically 9 full days.

Topping

Both Spain and Portugal have an extensive network of trains, which are both efficient and cheap. You may want to also add bus service to your options, as in Southern Spain, sometimes it is more convenient by bus than by train.

We recently travelled all over Southern Spain and Portugal, using the bus/train network, and had no problems. You could refer to our trip report:
http://www.fodors.com/forums/threads...amp;dirtyBit=1