Granada and la Alhambra

Granada was our last stop in Spain before leaving for the US. It is further north in Spain from where we were and is at the Base of the Sierra Nevada Mountains, which were covered in Snow. The main reason for the visit was to se the Alhambra which is a very old Islamic then Christian Fort/palace/gardens. It was first built some time in the 1200’s.It is a bunch of buildings surrounded by large fortifications and has great gardens, fountains, palaces etc. Unfortunately once again is it was raining heavily and quite cold. This made visiting this mostly outdoor attraction a bit tedious but is was still very interesting. Me and Corinne also spent one night out on the town after getting a private tour from a nice old man entirely in spanish.

Interesting name for a clothing shop

Good old fashioned meat.

Seville

Seville in southern Spain is a beautiful city that we visited while staying in Arcos. It is what we expected of Spain and has fantastic architecture, looks like a movie. We saw the cathedral which is huge and also wanted to see the Alcazar but is was shut. We had a great lunch and a good time walking around the city, it was really warm.

Plaza Espanya

Seville Cathedral

Here is the the Cathedrale De Seville, apparently the third biggest catholic cathedral in the world, of course first built as a mosque in a long time ago. It is very large and impressive and really emphasizes the amount of other peoples money the church was once able to spend on large structures - cynical but may have been better spent on poor people.

Very large columns

The tomb of Cristobel Colon - Or more commonly known as Christopher Columbus - There are many hotels in Spain named after him - Hotel Colon - mmmm.

Original garden from the mosque in a interior courtyard

Ronda

Here are some pics of Ronda, another Pueblos Blancos but larger than most and situated on a very large deep gorge. The gorge is one of the main attractions of the town as they built a massive bridge to span it and all the houses are right on the edge of the cliffs. It was very rainy and cold this day and we all got soaked.

Gorge

Bridge over gorge

Cold, wet, unhappy Corinne

Gorge

Arcos de la Frontera

Here are some pics of our stay in arcos, a small town in southern Spain, known as a Pueblos Blancos or white town. There are a bunch of these towns often in mountainous regions and are all full of white buildings making them really stand out. We visited most of them in the region on a really wet rainy day - unpleasant. In the sun though they all look brilliant and are lined with orange trees and all have nice little churches. We stayed in a great cheap hotel in Arcos - Los Olivos. While we were here we also traveled to Seville.