Northern Spain road trip
 

We are 2 couples planning a trip to Spain in May 2018 for 3 weeks from Seattle. We plan to spend 2 weeks in Madrid, Seville, Granada and Barcelona. We would like to do a road trip for 5 days from Barcelona to cover Northern Spain. I would like suggestions for best routes, sightseeing and places to stay. Our areas of interest are Ordesa NP in Pyrenees, Navarra, La Rioja, San Sebastian, Bilbao and Picos de Europa NP.

5 days to cover that much countryside?

Way too much for five days, I believe, but doable.

What we saw in northern Spain:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/mksfca...846065187/show

but I think that your bucket list is a too ambitious. It's a lot going one way. Do you plan to leave Spain from Barcelona? Then it's too much as a round trip.

I think you are being overly ambitious.

I spent about a month traveling through parts of northern Spain, (I didn’t even make it to Galicia) and into Catalunya and Barcelona. You can see my trip report here:
https://www.fodors.com/community/eur...-catalunya.cfm

That same trip report covers my 5 very busy days in Barcelona (and a few days in nearby locations). I didn’t file a trip report that covered my time in Madrid and nearby locations (10 days) or in Andalusia (11 days).

I strongly encourage you to get some good guidebooks (or spend some time with a few in your local library), identify the things you most want to see in each location, check their opening/closing times on the internet, and mark them on a calendar. Then pencil in your transportation, add some time on either side (for getting to/from your lodging, checking in/out, packing/unpacking, getting oriented, etc.). Then see how things fit together. And BTW, note that many things in Spain are closed on Monday, and often for all or part of Sundays too; and many things in Spain will also be closed daily for a very long mid-day break.