We knew our vacation was coming to a close as we headed up to Sevilla. After minor directional setbacks (i.e. lack of visible and prominent street signs), we finally found our hotel, Las Casas del Rey Baeza, recommended to us by our friend BlondeTulip. The small lobby was decked out in modern black & white furniture and they greeted us with ice water and sangria! As we entered our room, we were glad to have these modern amenities on our last two nights in Spain. The rooftop pool is amazing, but since it was Sunday afternoon and the Real Alcazar is closed on Mondays, we skipped the pool for now and made our way to the Alcazar before it closed for the day.

The royal palace was immense as it was amazing, but once you’ve seen one Moorish palace, you’ve seen them all. I still stand by the Mezquita as being the most impressive.

We booked tickets to a flamenco show at El Arenal that evening, so we laid out poolside the remainder of the afternoon.

I was happy to read, after the show, that the flamenco at El Arenal is the most professional of all shows in Sevilla. S + I were seated at the edge of the stage, so we got to see & hear everything up close. There were 2 older Italian couples seated behind us and by the middle of the show, one of the Italians decided that he could sing along. Wrong move buddy. S + I both swear that he got the evil eye from the lead singer and after he got sushed, I was convinced that the gypsies were going to jump him after the show. From that moment on, S + I patiently waited to eat or take a drink of water. Those flamenco women mean business.

Our last full day in Sevilla, sadly started out with a late breakfast (12noon) at one of the three Starbucks on Avenida de la Constitucion. We headed out to go shopping for gifts, but with high temperatures and high exchange rates, I was highly unmotivated to shop. So we went back to the hotel and laid out at the pool, the remainder of the afternoon.

S decided that we should go somewhere nice for our last night in Spain and that somewhere nice landed us at the Hotel Alfonso XIII – the BEST hotel in the city. They had just opened a restaurant in their patio and we were able to walk in without a reservation. The service and food were fabulous and the patio had Vegas-like water misters misting on intervals.

It was a wonderful ending to our vacation – but it wasn’t quite over.

We were on an early (9am) flight to Paris, so with checking out, returning the car, etc., we had to leave the city by 7am. In doing so, I think we managed to wake up the entire hotel: As I was showering, I saw Sylvain jump out of his skin, screaming that there was cockroach-like insect on the floor. Then I started screaming at him to get his shoe and kill it. No sanctity of life issues here. With that said, I really do want to recommend Las Casas as a great place to stay in Sevilla…maybe it was because our room was on the bottom floor, near the entrance…the pool, the room interior (sans roaches & other insects), the free & fresh oranges, the welcome sangria…perhaps, just a recommendation with high reservations?

By the time we got to the airport, we were happy to leave smoky, dirty Spain – I won’t even go into the cleanliness of the airport bathrooms were like – it’s Sevilla, not some back country village. (It seemed as though Spaniards love their cigarettes more than the French – by the time I went to bed every night, I felt like I had smoked at least two packs. Blech.)

Despite our last morning’s…ahem…activities, our vacation to Andalucia was wonderfully hot, wonderfully delicious and wonderfully relaxing.

We also learned that as we navigated the streets and roads of all these Spanish towns, S + I would be “that” couple on The Amazing Race getting frustrated with each other because they couldn’t find the frickin’ exit. Oh well.

Tagged: andalucia, sevilla, spain · Friday, September 5, 2008 · No Comments »

We set out a bit early as we had a long drive ahead of us to Vejer de la Frontera. About an hour outside of Granada we stopped for gas, as S was paying for gas, a package of cookies caught my eye:

Oh man! You just know I had to buy them and bring some home. For the record, they are quite tasty. A perfect treat for afternoon tea.

We knew we were getting to close to Gibraltar when signs to Gibraltar disappeared (Spain is apparently in no business to promote its location) and we started to see signs in Arabic (surreal) advertising ferry trips to Tanger. We’re driving, driving, driving and then all of a sudden we see this HUGE rock. That must be Gibraltar.

Unintentionally, we drove our rental car into the UK and decided to stop here for a few hours. It was in Gibraltar that we remembered to buy a music CD for the car – flamenco guitar, of course – and stopped for a late lunch of fish n’ chips. We made our way to the cable car/gondola that would take us to the top of the Rock. As we departed, there was a tail-less ape sitting on the cable structure, scoping out food I’m sure. We were greeted by more apes at the top. They were sitting in front of a sign that said something to the effect of “These apes equate all plastic bags with food. Please be sure to secure your belongings.” They weren’t kidding either. These apes just blended in with all us tourists. We took our requisite, this-is-as-close-as-we-got-to-Morocco pictures and high tailed it out of humid Gibraltar. That’s when we hit a snag, driving back into Spain. So, as I mentioned earlier, there were no passport people in the Sevilla airport to stamp my passport, so there was no indication that I could legally be in the country. Luckily, I still had our boarding passes accessible and was instructed to keep them with me at all times. We also had to explain that we were married since my passport is still in my maiden name and had to point out the amendment on the last page of my passport. Oy! This guy was much stricter than most US customs officers – really!

Within a few hours we arrived in Vejer de la Frontera, just before we burned up the transmission. You see, the quickest and most direct way into this hill town is to cross and gnarly intersection and drive a steep and narrow-for two-cars road where your option is to either roll down the steep hill or roll down the steep ditch. Luckily our poor little Corsa made it through the intersection and up the hill and delivered us safely to our hotel.

Unbeknownst to us, Vejer was in the midst of music festival. Our first night was flamenco. We had dinner at an amazing restaurant on the Plaza de Espana and walked around town as we waited for the flamenco show to start at…11pm! (At this point, I realized I could never live in Spain. Forced siestas. Evening events starting at 11pm or later. How do they do it?)

Before we headed out to a pueblo blanco, we managed to snag one of the last reservations at our hotels’ restaurant. Arcos de la Frontera is about an hour drive from Vejer. Again, S maneuvered the Corsa through the way too narrow streets and before we knew it, we had driven right out of town. So back again, we parked at a garage and walked.

The Parador provided air conditioned refuge and icy coca-colas before we made a quick walk through town. We passed on the ice cream this time around since we were still full from breakfast.

We read and lounged at the pool and walked about town a little more the remainder of the afternoon before our dinner reservation. About 45m before our reservation, we were both hungry and got a bite to eat at the Jardin del Califa express. OMG! Probably the best hummus we had ever had. S spoke with the guy working there once we realized he spoke French – counting out the change, “…cuatro, cinq, seis…”

Dinner at El Jardin del Califa was amazing! One of the better meals on this vacation. We started out with a typical mezze platter: hummus, feta, babagannoush, dolmas, falafel, tabbouleh – yum! S + I both had the couscous, served in real tagines. Sadly, I was already full after the hummus & pita and mezze platter that I couldn’t finish my couscous. But, as there is always room for dessert, we finished off our meal with bakalava and Morroccan mint tea – green tea infused with fresh mint and sweetened with rosewater.

Tagged: andalucia, food, spain · Wednesday, September 3, 2008 · No Comments »

En route to Granada, S + I also realized that we needed a music CD, pronto. We stopped in the small hill town of Antequera, as recommended by a friend. It’s a cute little town with a bullring. We stopped to have a quick lunch and quick stroll through town. Did I mention that it’s in the mid-90Fs by now? Instead of seeing the castle, all I could think of was, “AC! I need AC!” So we skipped the castle and continued on our way to Granada.

Finding our hotel in Granada was not as bad as Cordoba, thankfully. Though our digs for the next two nights weren’t in the center of town and it was geared towards business people, we had free parking, a thoroughly modern room, a television with CNN (yay!) and a pool. We settled in and mapped our route to the cathedral area. HUGE mistake. Maps don’t tell you if a particular street is a zona peatonal, or even a one way street. Again, the streets weren’t labeled as prominently as you expect for a metropolitan area. So we said, eff this, parked the car in a random, but true garage and walked to the center. As we walked around a bit and I was able to pull a klutzy kellybean in front of the cathedral. To my defense, I believe that they polish the stone steps everywhere in Spain…and that is why I managed to slip and fall on my ass in front of the tourist spot that is the cathedral. Nice.

The next day we opted got the last two spots for the late afternoon tour of the Alhambra (we failed to get our tickets beforehand) – which meant we could putz around in the morning and lay out by the pool before we had to head out.

Our tour of the Alhambra was led by Marco (Polo!) who conducted the tour in English and Italian (for the 4 Italians in our group). I think that for something so big, an organized tour is nice because you get more of the story behind the structure and purpose of the room you’re in. As beautiful as the Alhambra is, S + I still thought the Mezquita was more impressive. I think that Marco, at some point said that the Generalife gardens rivaled those of Versailles. Now, wait just a minute…maybe, just maybe in it’s heyday, but the Generalife pales in comparison to the gardens of Versailles.

After the tour was over, S + I made our way to the beautiful Alhambra Palace Hotel for drinks on their patio, as recommended by my uncle. It was a perfect place to unwind after walking the palace and gardens all afternoon. We ended our stay in Granada with a tapas dinner at Cascanueces and a late night stroll along the Acera del Darro. Again, a chocolate ice cream helped me forget that it was 92F at 11pm and that there were bats flying above my head as we crossed the bridge back to our hotel.

Tagged: andalucia, spain · · No Comments »

We arrived in Sevilla at the beginning of siesta and it showed. The airport was a ghost town and there were no passport officers around to stamp my passport. In our search for our rental car company, we discovered that [1] the company doesn’t have office space in the airport and [2] we had to call them to pick us up at the meeting point in the arrivals lobby. Lovely. After waiting for about 15-20m someone finally showed up to take us to our mode of transport for the next week: a lovely golden Opel Corsa.

So we headed out in the 90F+ heat to Cordoba, a drive in which we learned that most large transport trucks could out run and out power our little Corsa. Oh well, who’s in a hurry to climb that big hill?

The one thing about Spain that drove us crazy was lack of PROMINENT + VISIBLE street signs. It took us, no joke, about 45m-1h to find our hotel. S did a good job maneuvering the narrow streets – so narrow you had to question if it really was a street that allowed cars. Thanks to very broken Spanish and a bartender, we managed to find our hotel. It was hard to miss as the Mezquita was literally across the street.

After we got settled, we walked around the Jewish Quarter as best we could in the stifling heat – the chocolate ice cream cone helped ease my discomfort and we started on our tapas hop. Of all the tapas we had, I think that patatas bravas were my fave – roasted/fried potatoes with a creamy, spicy, tomato sauce. The jamon and manchego cheese were just as fabulous. Unfortunately, we were too full to check out a real neat salon de te we stumbled upon.

Per Rick Steves’ guide to Spain, the Mezquita opens 8a and is free until 10a, so wanting to beat the crowds and get started on our drive to Granada, we got into the Mezquita just before 10a. “Wow!” was my first reaction when I first stepped inside. I’ll spare you the history, but basically this is a mosque with a cathedral inside and it’s probably one of the most impressive buildings I have ever seen. The double arches, the intricate ceilings, the marble floor tiles that are the same size as prayer rugs. Unfortunately, our pictures don’t do this place justice and words just can’t describe, so I think you should check it out for yourself! (Oh, and props to Cordoba’s history as being a city where Jews, Christians and Muslim lived together – peacefully.)

Tagged: andalucia, spain · Tuesday, September 2, 2008 · No Comments »