Exploring Granada

We spent three amazing days in Andalucia in Granada, Southern Spain. Our hotel was in a busy area and about ten minutes walk from the busy bustling city where there were pedestrian streets with "Christmas" lights hanging in rows above us. We explored everywhere by foot including the Albaicin which is in a corner of the city on the hillside. This is mainly pedestrianised and reflective of Granada's Moorish ancestry. The Albaicin is the site of the first fortress built in the 13th century with cobbled alleys and villas with Moorish decorations and gardens. There were some stunning views and we could view the Alhambra (see below) perfectly. Many of the street names start with Cuesta which means 'slope'! We were also rewarded with a free orchestral concert conducted from the top of an apartment which was a school of music. It was lovely!

On one of our days in Granada we joined a tour bus which collected us from our hotel and took us to The Alhambra. This amazing complex dates back to the start of its construction in 1237. The gardens were built to be a recreation place for the King of Granada and the palace was built much later in 1525 for Charles V just after his marriage but he never actually lived there.

The Alhambra was a complete town within the walls with shops and public baths, but it fell into disrepair with nobody living there. In 1923 restoration began and continues today it being declared a World Heritage site in 1984.

Our extensive tour took three hours and then we continued to explore the places we missed such as the baths and the fort. With so much to oooh and aaah at and hours of walking we definitely enjoyed our final dinner (and wine) in Granada that evening.

Missing Africa by ONE minute!

The drive to Granada took most of the day and it was nearly midnight when we arrived. However on the way we passed hundreds of modern windmills dotting the landscape and stopped to explore lots of interesting places. During our stop in Tarifa, a 30min ferry ride to Africa, we suddenly had the urge to "just do it". The boat left at 3pm and it was 2.45pm and our passports were in the car parked a long way up the hill. We ran back to the car and pulled everything out of our backpacks and suitcase having momentary panic attacks when it took 10 mins to find the passports in the bottom of the suitcase. We rushed back to the boat with one minute to spare but weren't allowed on - bother, that was 15 very exciting minutes when we almost caught the boat to Africa! We had to be satisfied with blurred photos of it in the distance instead!

Our next stop was Gibraltar where we stopped to ogle the legendary rock and to laugh at the monkeys guarding this British colony. It was quite strange realising that residents here speak English, have British number plates and we were actually in the UK in the middle of Spain - bizarre!

Our last stop before Granada was Ronda and here we spent two hours exploring as it was a fabulous town, with great views and gorgeous white washed houses on steep banks.

A few hours later we finally reached our destination. Granada is in Andalucia in Southern Spain and the temperature continues to rise!

Living the High Life in a Monastery

On Monday 27 June we drove to Santa Maria near Cadiz in Southern Spain for just one amazing night in a monastery which had been converted into a fabulous hotel. It was unbelievably luxurious with marble staircases, 16th century paintings hanging on the walls of long corridors and huge chandeliers, original monks' kneeling benches and gorgeous courtyards. For a really reasonable price we had a luxury suite and free wifi. In fact we have stayed in 4star hotels or equivalent everywhere we have been and have paid less (often much less) than $100 a night except in Barcelona where it was very slightly more. Booking online as we go seems to be the way to travel.
Santa Maria was a delightful little place with very narrow cobbled streets, cute restaurants and interesting markets by the river. We also discovered that petrol is 30cents a litre cheaper in Spain than in Portugal!

Next morning we took the very slow winding scenic route to Granada.

Soaking up the sun!

We are now back home in freezing Canberra (minus 5 last night) so this title does not seem very apt! However I need to bring us to the present day so back I go to.........

Days of endless sunshine and a washing machine meant an opportunity to relax, run, swim and wash our clothes instead of buying new ones! Damn!

It had reached 40deg when we arrived in Albufeira in The Algarve and it has been hot and sunny, with temps between 37 and 41deg, every day since. We stayed in a resort near Albufeira about 2km walk from the beach. It had six swimming pools, one of which was long enough to swim lengths (at least 20metres) and actually feel like we had exercised. We ran three of the four mornings we were there - 7.3km, 11.3km and 9km. They weren't long distances but undulating, uneven cobbles made for a considerably slower pace than it should have been. Actually, that's my excuse. The true reason for the speed (or lack of it) could be the extra kilos which have have made their way round my waistline and butt. Even my running clothes feel tight which is not a good sign! Hmmm - a lot of hard work is needed in the two weeks we are home before leaving for Vanuatu on 20 July to run in the ultra marathon relay team.

But oh, it has been worth it. We loved our time in The Algarve. Our washing dried outside, we ran and went for a swim straight afterwards, sometimes up to 40 lengths, all before breakfast.

Later in the afternoon we would go for swims at the beach and inbetween browse round the interesting little shops or drive further afield to check the sights such as the day we drove to the most south western point in Europe (Cape St Vincente) where there was a working lighthouse (although we didn't see any ships), great views and a windswept little town nearby.

We spent four nights in The Algarve before heading for Southern Spain.

Evora - town of secrets

Mr B prefers taking the scenic route rather than taking the autovia (motorway) which would have halved the time but also would have halved the fun! Instead we drove through interesting little towns and rolling rather dry countryside, spotting modern windmills and the occasional old windmill, for more than six hours, to reach the most delightful little medieval town of Evora. We found ourselves driving through extremely narrow winding cobbled streets within the city walls. It took a lot of narrow misses squeezing past walls you could reach out and touch and avoiding pedestrians. When we finally arrived at the hotel after a few hair raising moments the hotel receptionist told us in no uncertain terms that we were parked on a pedestrian only street and we should move the car. We did however want to carry our bags up the stairs to our room first. We had managed to fit overnight stuff into our smallest suitcase and Manuel (he reminded me of Manuel out of Faulty Towers) grabbed the bag and ran flat out up the stairs waving his arms in vague directions on the way indicating the breakfast bar, lounge etc. We were exhausted by his anxiety which appeared to be caused by our car being illegally parked outside for five minutes!

Evora has a population of 41,000 and seemed uncannily quiet apart from a few tourists and locals wandering about. We re-parked the car and explored the town. It was gorgeous, so many narrow little steep laneways, cobbles everywhere and inviting little doors indicating hidden treasues behind them. There were lots of squares full of quite busy restaurants but we opted for the one recommended by Manuel which proved to be an excellent choice. Our waiter, who didn't speak a word of English, was like a little bird twitching around and trying to be helpful. Dave had the recommended pork and clams dish while I opted for Portuguese style lamb chops which proved to be a fantastic choice as they were so tasty and juicy. I would love to know what secret spices went into that recipe.

Later we walked and walked exploring every nook and cranny. In one of the main squares there was a large number of brightly coloured fibreglass model pigs. Apparently there was a meeting of the pork community and all the pigs had been painted by different schools to welcome them. It was quite bizarre!

Next day we were looking forward to checking out all those mysterious shops only to find that it was a public holiday all over Europe for Corpus Christi so those doors remain a secret yet to be discovered. This public holiday also meant that a number of tourist spots were closed. However we were lucky to find that the Capela dos Ossos (Chapel of Bones) was well and truly open for viewing. Oh boy, what a gruesome place that was! A small room behind the altar has walls and columns lined with carefully arranged bones and skulls of about 5,000 people! An inscription over the entrance reads "We bones await yours". It was truly macabre. Oh and to complete the picture there were two hanging mummified corpses - mmmmm, yes delightful!

Near where we had parked the car there were some ruins of a Roman temple to explore and some lovely views. We did like Evora and were sorry we didn't have longer there to enable us to walk along the Aquaduct which is an 8km walk in one direction which could pose a problem at the other end - somewhere to consider in the future perhaps.

Next stop - The Algarve and some time to run!