First off, my apologies for the lack of comments recently. I must admit I have actually still not caught up with parts of my blogroll since my trip to Andalusia and I currently have 333 unread posts. It will probably take a while until I get back into the swing of things and to posting comments regularly, but I will get to it eventually.

Now, finally the last part of my Granada review. I did upload the pictures yesterday already but it was too late to write a review, as I now work Mondays to Wednesdays and have to get up at 8.15am [I know that it isn't very early but for me it is, it also means I should get to bed at 1am at the very latest].

The day I arrived in Granada, I visited the Capilla Real [where you were not allowed to take pictures so I don't have any] and the Cathedral which are right next to each other. And while most Cathedrals make me think that the Catholic Church has way too much money, they are usually very impressive and nice to visit; I remember this one was quite big.

Afterwards I walked through the streets of the Alcaicería, the Arab bazaar of Granada. As far as I know this used to be where silk was sold, but now the narrow streets are full of tourist stores. Sounds worse than it is, as they have so many beautiful Arabic things to look at and buy.

I walked around the old town some more and saw the Plaza Bib-Rambla and the Corral de Carbon.

That night I went on a tapas tour with a few people from the hostel. The great thing about tapas in Granada is that when you order a drink, you generally get a tapa along with the drink [and it is not always just snack sized] so you can eat for very cheap. Afterwards we went to a tetería where I had a milk shake [at a tetería, yes, but it was hot, and I really didn't feel like drinking hot tea when it was already so hot outside]. We also smoked hookah [shisha] and that was the first time I did in my life, however, I am not sure I can see what is so special about it.

Anyway, the next day was Monday, my birthday, and I went to see the Alhambra. I got there, got my ticket from one of the ticket machines [which meant I only stood in line for a couple of minutes] and went to the Palacios de los Nasrides, which are essentially the main attraction of the Alhambra. And they really were breathtaking. The detail that went into the facades is just amazing. Unfortunately the famous lions from the Lions’ Court were not there as they were being restored.

Continue reading Granada finally…

I will post the Granada pictures sometime this weekend, but here is a first taste.

This is my first try at a panorama, using Canon PhotoStitch [a software that came with my camera]. I took this at the Mirador de San Nicolas in Granada. It is the Alhambra with the Sierra Nevada in the background and the town of Granada to the right.

You can see the big version here.

By the way, if you have any advice on how to make the stitching disappear, please let me know. [I've already tried to make them less visible, but they're still there.]

And happy 4th of July to all my American readers!

You can find the first to reviews of Sevilla and Córdoba here and here. This is another scheduled posting and I should be on the way home from my cousin’s wedding when this gets posted.

I got to Málaga on Wednesday quite late, so that night I didn’t really do much. I ended up having dinner with two Dutch guys at the hostels. They had cooked too much food, so they asked if I wanted to eat with them. It was actually quite good and very nice to meet the people at the hostel.

On Thursday, I went to see the Cathedral, and then ran some errands [going to the bank, buying new SD memory cards for my camera because I knew else I would run out of space in Granada]. I ended up taking quite a long nap in the evening after taking a walk along the beach [which was just a few minutes from the hostel]. I had a cold so I tried to rest more during my stay in Málaga. It worked out quite nicely as there was not that much to see in Málaga anyway.

That night I watched the Germany - Portugal soccer game on TV with a bunch of people at the hostel, and I was the only one there who was supporting Germany. Al the others were supporting Portugal even though none of them was actually Portuguese. That made it even better that we won! I ended up getting a free drink from the barkeeper too! Sweet! After the game, I went running along the beach which was really nice. There is actually a running route on the beach and the sand is not as soft so it is good for running.

On Friday, I went to Nerja with a Kiwi girl I met at the hostel, and we had a really great day there. We first went to see the cave which was just breathtaking. I don’t think the pictures can even capture how amazing it was, it really makes you aware of how amazing nature is.

Continue reading Málaga & Nerja…

[This is a scheduled post. I should be on a plane somewhere between Barcelona and Munich at the time this is posted.] Read my review of Sevilla here.

I got to Córdoba on Tuesday in the early afternoon. After dropping off my luggage at the hostel, I went right to the Mezquita [mosque]. Its construction was started in the year 600, about 1400 years ago, and it was turned into a Roman Catholic cathedral [which it is today] in the 13th century. It is a huge and very impressive building, with its arches seemingly repeating into infinity.

I then took a walk through town, through the Judería [Jewish quarter] as well as another quarter that is famous for its patios, to the Puente Romano an old Roman bridge.

Continue reading City #2 - Córdoba…

It is almost 3am but I really wanted to post a review of the first city of my Andalusia trip before I go to bed. I was busy last night and today sorting through and uploading pictures. Maybe a lame way to spend my last day in Barcelona, but I think I needed the rest before this very stressful weekend. My friend Anna came by tonight for a short while which was nice. But I will hopefully be able to visit her in Vienna sometime this summer, so I think we will see each other again soon. And tomorrow morning I am going to have coffee with Clara.

I am kind of melancholy about leaving - I am so excited to go back home to Munich and see all my friends, but I am sad at the same time about the city and friends I am leaving behind. I do think I will stay in touch with some friends and probably see them again [Europe is not that big, especially thanks to cheap airlines] and I think I will definitely come back to Barcelona soon. There are still many places I want to see, and I have really come to love this city in the past year. It’s such a vibrant place, I don’t think coming back here could ever be boring, no matter how long I have lived here. Maybe that is why I don’t really feel the need to say goodbye. Or maybe I am just in denial and trying to make it easier for me not to think about it too much.

Anyway, on to Sevilla. Sevilla was really beautiful, and probably my favorite city out of the entire trip. I definitely took the most pictures there. It is so weird, it has not even been two weeks since I went there, yet it already seems so distant because my mind is filled with more recent memories from all the other cities. I had already posted a few pictures while I was in Sevilla, so here are a bunch more. I think it goes without saying that this [along with the following ones] will be a very image-heavy post but I hope you will enjoy looking at them.

The first day, all I did was a short walk around the neighborhood of the hostel and a tapas tour and a flamenco show that the hostel offered.

The next day, I went to visit the Alcázar, which is the castle of the city [every city I visited had one], and by the way, the one in Sevilla was the most beautiful besides the Alhambra [castle of castles] of course. I love the Moorish architecture that is so present everywhere in Andalusia. The details are so beautiful.

I also loved the gardens of the Alcázaba in Seville. You’d never know from looking at these pictures how dry Andalusia is.

Then I visited the cathedral, which was quite beautiful too. I went up the Giralda, the tower and had a nice view over the city.
Continue reading A review of Sevilla…