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If you read our Christmas Newsletter, then you know that we had planned on going to Spain in 2010.  We have friends there, and we were really looking forward to traveling for 14 days through mostly southern Spain.  We had even considered a side trip (a daytrip) to Morocco and maybe a day or two in Portugal, neither of which we’ve ever visited.

But it was not to be.  We still hope to go, but just not in May like we had hoped.  Maybe in the late fall, while the weather is still good, IF the dollar recovers. Or 2011, although we might go to Germany with friends that year.

Anyway… this is what our trip (or at least our possible trip) was going to be.     We usually travel with a mix of schedule and serendipity.

We like to have a room waiting for us.  Someone advised us once that on a trip to Italy that we could save a ton of money by not booking ahead.  The cheapest rooms aren’t in the books or online, he said.  You get off the train and go with one of the hawkers.  Dirt cheap, he said.  And that may be true, but we arrived on a holiday that wasn’t listed in ANY of the guidebooks.  Not only were there no rooms, we couldn’t even drive our car down into the town (”it’s full”, the policeman said).   We spent 6 hours looking for a room.  That’s the only time we’ve ever done that (or ever will again).

But for the rest…… we play it by ear.  If we know that there is something we absolutely want to see (Machu Picchu for instance), we buy our tickets as far ahead as possible.  Otherwise, we make a list of what there is to do and then decide what to do when we get there.  With the list,  we don’t miss something important, since we knew it was there.  When we showed our photos of a great trip to Montreal to dear friends who had been there the year before (and said it was, “eh… okay”), they said,  “We didn’t know that was there.  How did we miss that?”     But by not planning too tightly, we aren’t set into a rushed schedule.  Besides, our favorite travel thing is just to walk and look.  We once spent a week across from the Louvre and never went inside.  We just never got around to it.  We walked and walked, sat at sidewalk cafes, went to a movie in a tiny Parisien theater.

So when I say this is the plan for Spain….  take it with a grain of salt.

Anway, arrive a.m. Barcelona, stay two nights, a couple of days with our friends in a village just west of Barcelona, Madrid, Toledo, Seville, Segovia, Cordoba, Granada, Morocco, and a day or two in Portugal.  A couple of these would be day trips or  1/2 day stops along the way to the next overnight stay  (we were planning on getting a Eurail Pass).  A rental car only to go into Portugal (and even that’s a maybe).  A ferry across to Morocco for just the one day. Sounds like an exciting trip, doesn’t it?  Oh well, maybe next time.  If we dropped someplace, it would probably be Portugal.  We’d love to see Portugal, but couldn’t do it justice in a day or two.  For that matter, I’d bet that a day trip to Morocco probably only shows the worst of Morocco, but it’s too exotic to pass up.

Here’s a Fodor’s itinerary for 10 days, and all of these cities are on the Spain page of our (this) website.

And don’t forget our other websites.  We’re really excited about Rooms With Great Views.  Perusing the pages there sure makes me want to go someplace.  The views are incredible.  Type “Spain” into the “Search this site…” box for photos of great views taken from hotels in Spain.

You can also visit A Garden in the City.  Enjoy.

Tags:   southern Spain · Spain · travelNo Comments