Having spent much of the day exploring Córdoba we didn't arrive in Seville until late afternoon, this however still gave us plenty of time to get our bearings and start exploring the city before dinner. Our evening included visiting the 'Metropol Parasol' which is a huge wooden structure located at La Encarnación square, in the old quarter of Seville. It was designed by a German architect and completed in April 2011. It's massive, 150 metres lon...

Heading south from Granada the landscape changed. The earth became more red, the vegetation more sparse and the hills became more rocky and sheer. Perhaps it was the heat we'd been experiencing for the past few days, or perhaps I've watched too many movies, but it felt like we would should be seeing huge cactuses growing at the roadside and from behind would appear bandits wearing sombreros. Well there were no bandits but I was right about the cactuses, ...

Granada was another quick overnight stop, in fact so quick if we'd blinked we might have missed it. Tony had booked tickets online for a guided tour through Alhambra on the afternoon we arrived and that proved to be well worth the money spent. Alhambra is a Moorish palace and fortress that was originally constructed in 889 and then largely ignored until its ruins were renovated and rebuilt in the mid-11th century. In 1333, it was converted into a Royal Pala...

After picking up our rental car in Barcelona, it was time to start our gradual drive towards the south of Spain. We had booked a 'medium' sized car (as 'small' rental cars are not allowed on the motorways in Spain) and our wheels for the next few days turned out to be a very racy black Alfa Romeo, Giulietta. The drive from Barcelona to Valencia takes about three and a half hours, opting for the quicker toll roads, as taking the non toll routes wou...

Leaving our friends Doug and Janet in Venice (as were driving north to continue their European adventure), Tony and I boarded our flight from Venice Treviso airport, Barcelona bound. I had a window seat which gave me the perfect wing shot on takeoff and those of you who know me well, will know I love wing shots. We had a shuttle booked as part of our Ryan Air flight and the driver gave us a running commentary of points of interest and famous buildings on our dr...