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Published: December 31st 2008
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Sept 22, 2008
Steve and I are sitting at Gate K in the Madrid Airport waiting for our flight to leave for Granada. Our 16:10 flight has been delayed until 5pm. Yikes! But at least we're in the right place. For the last hour we've been traveling between Gate M, as it states on our boarding pass to Gate K where our flight is actually departing from. Here at the MAD airport (Yes, that's Madrid's actual airport code) they don't post what gate number your departing from until about an hour before and it can take almost that time to get to your gate. This airport is so big that you need to take a train to get to the various gates, and the travel times between each gates is anywhere from 10 minutes to 29 minutes. The air port has some spectacular architecture, and great restaurants. After arriving in Granada we picked up the car and headed for Padul where our B&B is located. The directions we got from the B&B Web Site we very detailed and easy to follow so we had no problems finding the place. Our host Jeremy met us at the door and showed us to
our room. We were getting hungry so Jeremy told us about a place in the center of Padul that was just a 5 minute walk away. We were not that hungry so we had some Calamari and Salad. The food was very good. After telling the waitress that it was our honeymoon she brought out some little dark and white chocolates that she had carved into little hearts plus she gave a little Cupid figure to Barb. It was a wonderful start to our stay.
Sept 24, 2008
The last two days have been fast paced and busy. Yesterday (Sept 23) we had made arrangements with our B&B host Jeremy to have breakfast at 09:00. Well we missed breakfast entirely and didn't wake up until 11:00. We decided to head into Granada and get a bite to eat there. We parked at the Alhambra and walked down to Plaza Neuva. We wandered through the narrow winding streets until we ended up in Plaza Bib Rambla, and ate at a cafe with the same name. We wandered a bit more, sometimes ducking into the little shops and taking lots of pictures of the wonderful architecture. We found the tourist office
where we purchased the City Pass. The City Pass allows free admission into many museums and other attractions, it also includes 9 bus rides on local transit, plus a hop on and hop off sightseeing bus. We decided to take this opportunity to see Granada in all its glory and see what it has to offer. The sights on the tour were not that exciting but it gave us a good sense of the city and neighbourhoods. We got back off the bus where it started at the Cathedral. We had already toured much of the Cathedral area before the bus tour and decided to head back towards Plaza Nueva. We stopped at a wonderful little pastry shop and both had a Pan au Chocolate pastry while sitting on a city bench and watching the world go by. We decided to walk a little further and came across some construction. A road under construction did not seem very appealing so we almost turned back but then decided to explore a little further anyways. We are so glad that we did! The road led along a winding river a bordering the Alhambra. The street was full of great little shops and
the views of the Alhambra walls high above and the houses along the wall were spectacular. We also spotted many, many cats and kittens at the rivers edge. We assumed that this is probably their hunting ground. We saw a few burrows in the side of the cliff as well were some of them must live.
After continuing along for a while we headed uphill away from the river and were swallowed in a weaving system of narrow roads and homes. We could not stop taking pictures because everything was so interesting. We wandered through a whole neighbourhood of 'Teterias' (Tea Houses) before arriving back at the main road. We stopped in at the Central Cafe for come wonderful wine (we wish we knew the name) and Tapas before heading back up the steep hill to the Alhambra and our car.
We managed to figure our the directions in reverse to get us back to our B&B.
Sept 24
Today we set the alarm so that we would not sleep in again. We woke at 7:30 and arrived downstairs for breakfast at 8:00. Jeremy was not expecting us until 9:00 so we had to apologize for catching
him off guard. He graciously moved our breakfast schedule up since we had to be at the Alhambra by 9:30. Jeremy gave us the 20-questions quiz about our opinions on US Politics, The Environment and our occupations. After a wonderful breakfast of scrambled eggs, toast, coffee and fresh squeezed orange juice we hit the road back to the Alhambra. We parked and entered the grounds and immediately started looking for the Nazaries Palace since we had to enter at our alloted time of 10:30. The palace was breathtaking. Lots and lots of pictures. We're sure that none of them will do it justice. Afterward we went over to the Generalife area (which means Architect's Garden). We wandered through the huge maze of garden paths and fountains which seemed to go on forever. Finally we headed to the Alcazaba (Citadel) but we were missing one ticket so we decided to skip it since they wouldn't let us in without it. Good thing since we would have been completely exhausted for the rest of the afternoon.
We headed back to the B&B, bought a bottle of wine from the self-serve bar and enjoyed a wonderful afternoon sipping wine and reading on
the patio and in the living room until dinner. For dinner we tried the La Cantina de Manual restaurant in town. The restaurant was very nice but the food was rather mediocre. The fly that kept buzzing around our heads seemed to like it though!
Tonight we're finishing up our journal and will try and make it an early night since we're planning on a hike tomorrow.
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