(Pictured above- we signed in at the American legation in Morocco- see previous post)

When we awoke on our last morning in Morocco, we were ready to begin our journey to Spain via ferry. The previous day we had walked to the port and made sure we knew where our ferry would be departing from. We arrived early to the port and were approached by a man anxiously saying “port closed, all ferry cancelled.”. We take statements like this with a grain of salt. You see, in many other countries there are scams where locals tell you things are closed, only to get you to go in their taxi or let them guide you somewhere else for money. We kept walking and the man kept following us saying “closed, closed”. He didn’t look official, so we continued on. As we approached the port gates another man, who actually looked official, said “sorry all ferries canceled due to wind and weather”. Huh? He could tell we looked flustered so he called over his co-worker who spoke English. The man nicely explained that we could go to the other port on the other side of the city and catch a ferry at 11am if we hurried. He said our tickets would be honored since ours was cancelled. “You must hurry!” he said, “get taxi and hurry.” We had used all of our Moroccan dirham (money), so now John had to run and find an ATM to pay the taxi. He returned after getting cash and asked where the ferry tickets were. “I gave them to you!” He said. “No, no, you didnt”. I replied. This was one of those tense travel moments. I knew I didnt have them. John eventually replied he had put them in his pocket. Whew!

We took the 30 minute taxi ride to the other side of the city and made it in time for the ferry. We now would be arriving in Algercias, Spain, instead of our original planned destination of Tarifa. Luckily we would be able to catch the same bus we would have taken in Tarifa- to our destination of Seville. Our ferry ride took us through the strait of Gibraltar, a very beautiful and windy ride.

John and I noticed 3 Spanish men on the ferry who no joke each smoked 6 cigarettes within the first 30 minutes, and didnt stop there. We had never seen anything like it. They were just sucking them down.

We arrived in Spain and were able to walk to the bus station. We had 30 minutes before our bus and were pretty hungry. The bus ride would be 3 hours so we had to get something. We ordered personal pizzas from a restaurant in the bus station. 25 minutes later they still weren’t ready. The lady said “Cinco minutes”. John told me to run and save seats on the bus. With my bag underneath the driver began to pull the bus away. “ Please sir, my husband is coming”. The annoyed driver looked at me and said something in Spanish, which I didnt understand. It was still 2 minutes before departure time. ‘Uno minute please”, I said.  Just as I was about to get off the bus there was John running towards it with 2 huge pizzas wrapped in foil, his big pack on his back. It was quite funny looking back on it. As he got on the bus and sat down breathing sighs of relief the bus took off. We barely made it! And now we had 2 huge “personal pizzas” with grease dripping out of the bottom- our first meal in Spain. They were not the “personal” size we were expecting, that’s for sure. The toppings also were not what we thought we ordered. My pizza had tuna on it, and John’s some strange meat and sharp cheese. Whatever- we were hungry and relieved.

A group of about 5 men boarded our bus at one of the first stops. They looked a little ragged and had bottles of wine and beers. They had obviously been drinking (a lot) and were not planning on stopping. They sat near the back of the bus and began singing songs in Spanish. It was quite funny. I would guess these men were in their 50’s. John and I had quite the first impression of Spain riding with these guys.

The landscape on the ride was really pretty! We really enjoyed the scenery , and watched a movie downloaded on my computer- “Winter’s Bone” with Jennifer Lawrence.  The bus stopped at one point and all the drunk men got out to pee on the side of the road. Was this a rest stop? John really had to pee also. With no bathroom to be found and no clue where the bus driver went, John copied the other men to relieve himself. Well, I hope he doesn’t get arrested in a foreign country for public urination. That would really stink- I thought.

He didn’t, and our ride with singing Spanish drunk songs continued. Once in Seville we grabbed a taxi since our hotel was too far to walk. Using Hilton points, we had booked our free stay with Hilton Garden Inn. It was a bit out of the way from the city center, but hey- it was free! The town of Seville (sometimes referred to as Sevilla) was so lovely, all decorated for Christmas! After we checked in the concierge referred us to a Spanish tapas place for dinner. We were excited to see what this tapas thing was all about. The restaurant had no other customers when we arrived and it appeared they were just setting up and opening for the night (at 8 pm).

The server approached asking us something- he didnt speak English at all. “Wine please”, I said. “Sorry no”, he replied. What? Wasn’t I in Spain? Not Morocco? There was wine , why was he telling me no? He misunderstood me and when I pointed to a wine bottle he understood eventually. John picked out about 7 tapas for us to share. We weren’t really sure what we would be getting- this would become a common trend throughout our time in Spain. They brought them over one by one periodically and we savored every bite! Everything was delicious! I love cheese so I pretty much devoured a goat cheese tapa by myself.So good!  We noticed by 10pm the restaurant was really getting busy. We would soon discover this was the time most Spaniards eat dinner. They tend to have all meals later than any other European country. Breakfast around 9-10am, lunch around 3pm, tapas / snack 6pm and then dinner at 10pm.

We thoroughly enjoyed our first “real” meal in Spain. The next morning we set out knowing we had a busy day. We only had this whole day to explore Seville, and wanted to make the most of it! We didnt realize when we left at 9am, that we wouldn’t be back to the hotel for 16 hours.

Seville has a very nice and convenient city bus that easily got us to the city center. We first explored a beautiful park, Plaza de Espana, then the Royal palace/Alcazar and gardens. We spent a great deal of time exploring, as it was all beautiful!

Plaza de Espana

Alcazar Garden

lost in the Maze Garden Alcazar

The Renaissance-Moorish Architecture of the Alcazar was really cool

We loved walking around the pretty city of Seville, and exploring the gorgeous cathedral!

We needed SIM cards for our phones, since the ones from Morocco would no longer work in Spain. We found a vodaphone store and bought some. For some reason they weren’t as easy to set up in our phones, as the SIMs in Morocco. The customer service representative at the store spoke zero English and had no idea how to help us. She tried, and tried, and tried some more. She called vodaphone customer service with no success. After wasting about 40 minutes, we finally left. We knew if we could find wiFi we could google how to do it and figure it out ourselves. We passed by cafe, after cafe, after cafe, all busy with customers drinking wine and eating delicious looking meals- but none had WiFI. OK – so we left Morocco, where there was no alcohol or wine anywhere but wiFI everywhere, and now we were in a country with the opposite situation.

We finally found a place with good food and WIFI! I had a delicious salmon salad and John a huge sandwich. He was able to figure out the SIM card without issue!

After lunch we walked around some more, finding a lively square with people sitting outside along multiple cafes/ bodegas. We decided to have some wine and people watch. Everyone seemed so happy! There were women dancing in the street, groups sitting around playing music and singing. It was so fun!  After awhile we walked some more to get a change of scenery. John wanted to go to another videophone store to buy us a back up phone charger. I said I’d wait for him at yet another outside cafe. While he was gone I tried to order a glass of wine but they wouldn’t accept credit cards- only euro. Two guys saw my dilemma and offered to pay for me. ‘Oh, no thats ok.” I replied. “No please, we don’t mind”, they insisted. I told them my husband would be back any minute with cash and reimburse them. They were nice guys, telling me all about Seville and how they had both been to the US. When John returned I introduced them to my new friends. He bought them each cervasa (beer), and we continued chatting. Other friends joined our new buddies so now we had quite a group. Everyone was really nice !

John and I left them around 9pm to eat dinner, but promised to find them again afterwards. John googled the best tapa restaurant in the area and we had another absolutely amazing dinner! The croquettes are so good in Spain!  They can be filled different ingredients- some have ham, some cheese, other fish or mushrooms.

We found our buddies after dinner at  a really neat beer garden. What do you know- more wine! We had a really great time! I debated American politics with one guy, and helped another plan out his proposal to his girlfriend. We eventually realized it was time to go home- as my dad says nothing good happens after midnight 🙂

The next morning we both felt a little rough. We were definitely not used to that much wine in one evening! We had a great time though! We set out that afternoon for our next city- Granada!

We had been told back in Morocco by a fellow American traveler that the Alhambra in Granada, was not to be missed! We had heard this from others and were really excited! He warned us that it often sells out and to book tickets ahead of time. We had been unable to reserve tickets online previously and called our hotel in Granada for assistance. They told us we could arrive early when it opened and try to get tickets, as the “pre online” tickets were sold out. Bummer! As we waited to board our train to Granada, we checked one more time and suddenly there was tickets available! Yay! All booked for the day after Christmas!

We arrived in Granada on Christmas Eve via train. The Spain train system is super convenient and reasonably priced! Granada sits in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada mountains with a population a little over 200,000. Our charming hotel was set up much like a riad, with a courtyard in the middle and cave like walls.

The concierge was very friendly and gave us many tips and suggestions. He told us that since it was Christmas Eve , many things would be closed early. We walked around the very hilly, and beautiful city. We ended up eating fast food Moroccan food (yes, in spain) for dinner, as everything else was closed.

Christmas morning we set out on a 15 mile hike all through the town. Gorgeous views at every turn!

Guard Kitty– seriously it was guarding this house

We went to the viewpoint St. Nicolas (very appropriate for Christmas), and a lovely cathedral.

We had a great lunch of iberian ham (their speciliaty) and croquettes with monkfish.

Our concierge, Wilford, had booked us tickets to what he called the “best” flamenco show for Christmas evening, who even entertained the Obamas on their trip to Granada.

We saw a sign earlier near our hotel advertising “10 tapas and sangria for only 18 euros”. Sounded like great deal! We went there before the Flamenco show. The place was packed and only 1 girl was working. Our tapas were not very good and we both were disappointed seeing as it was Christmas. We reminded ourselves though of the fabulous lunch we had earlier and were content.

We walked about a mile up the steep hill to our Flamenco show. We arrived earlier thinking we would just have a drink and relax. We were greeted by a very rude man, “reservations” as he looked at us unwelcoming. “yes, we have tickets”. He grabbed our tickets and looked at them confused. “Names”, he asked. ‘john, kinsay”, we replied. He scribbled on a pad “Hon and Kensi”. then walked away. He returned a few minutes later “ nueve”! He said “ yes, we know, Drink please while we wait.”. He looked at us like we were crazy “nine, nine”. he said rudely. Jeez. A man arrived and asked what was going on. He apparently was the owner. He was much nicer than the other guy and told us we could relax and have wine while we wait. We sat down and the rude man quickly directed us to sit somewhere else”these seats for family only”. Ok—- we watched as the performers arrived, scarfing down food and drinks before their performance.  A large group of about 30 Korean tourists arrived and we were directed to the cave sitting area with them. Flamenco shows are traditionally held in a small cave setting where everyone has a front row view.  As we sat waiting for the performance the begin, the rude man came in asking us to step outside. What now? “ticket!” He said. John replied, “we gave them to you.”. He acted as if he didnt know what we were talking about. “ where are your tickets?” he asked again. “ We gave them to you and you wrote our names on your pad!”, John answered. This was getting ridiculous. We had felt very unwelcome since the minute we walked into this place. We were really close to leaving, and would have asked our hotel to get us a refund. The owner appeared and asked us for our tickets. We told him once again, we had given them to the other guy. The owner apologized and said not to worry. He told us to just please enjoy the show. I was really annoyed by this time. I has really been excited for this show, but my excitement had dwindled with all the negative vibes the jerk was giving us.

The show began, and my excitement returned! Every performer was amazing! They moved their feet in such a fast, precise manner. Every step was mesmerizing!  The dancers keep a very stern, serious expression throughout the performance. I thoroughly enjoyed every minute of it! One of the male dancers even pulled me up at the end to dance.

After the show we headed back to our hotel where I face timed my family and wished them Merry Christmas! I definitely missed them a lot, but was happy to be spending the holiday with John in Spain.

Excited to see the Alhambra, we arrived the next morning as soon as the gates opened. We were surprised to already see there was a huge line to get in! We had to leave by noon to catch our bus to Cordoba, so we had a time limit. We knew we needed a good couple hours to explore this enormous and amazing place! Everyone in the long line seemed fine with just waiting for what could be hours. With no instructions or people to ask for help, my assertive husband told me to wait in line while he assessed the situation. He came back 10 minutes later after figuring out there were kiosks that we could print our tickets from and enter without waiting in the long line. Nobody else seemed to know about this. Good thing he was so assertive!

We  were able to spend a few hours walking around the entire property.

The Alhambra is an ancient fortress and palace complex, originally constructed in 889. In the 13th century it was a Muslim/ Moorish establishment and then later in 1492 became the palace for Christian rulers of Spain.  For many centuries it was unoccupied and left to despair. It was rediscovered in the 19th century and now a world UNESCO heritage site, due to its vast array of both historical Islamic architecture and Christian architecture intertwined.

cats of the Alhambra

We had such an amazing time in beautiful Granada! Next stop Cordoba…

Hasta la Vista-

<3, Kinz