The La Mancha countryside with olive groves and vineyards.
The Don Quixote windmills.
The Alhambra as seen from our restaurant.
The gardens at the Alhambra.
The Moorish stucco - see the color?
Every door and room was decorated with the beautiful stucco.
From Toledo, we drove south towards Granada. On the way, we stopped at the Don Quixote windmills in La Mancha. The windmills were up on a hill (where there is a lot of wind) with a view of the surrounding farmland. The local crops are olives and wine grapes. Most of the olive oil in the world comes from Spain – they actually sell olives to the Italians. They are working on switching over from wine grapes to olives. The wine from this region tends to be crappy and the olive oil sells for more money. The windmills were actually used for milling wheat although they don’t grow as much wheat here as they used to.
We arrived in Granada in time for a walking tour and dinner. Granada, in the south of Spain, is the gateway to Morocco. The Moroccan influence was obvious in the restaurants and souvenir stores. The smell of incense poured out of all the little souvenir stores. The streets were narrow and dirty. There were lots of homeless people and weird looking hippies. Lots of them had scraggy-looking dogs. I really did not like this city. But it did have some redeeming factors.
For dinner, Dennis and I went to a wine bar. Granada is one of the last cities to serve tapas free with your drinks. Our tour guide advised us to keep an eye on what other people were getting and make sure you get the same. At our wine bar, we sat right at the bar so we could ask the bar tender about the wines. We ordered a glass each and we got our tapa – a toothpick with a grape and a square of cheese. OK, that’s a bit underwhelming. But we saw the chef deliver a platter with a gorgeous seafood salad (mussels, carrots, red peppers in vinaigrette). With my great high-school Spanish, I asked the bartender, “Que es esto?” With that, he gave us each a small serving of the salad. We ordered a few other tapas off the menu, too. The menu for once was understandable and the prices were listed clearly as well. Another glass of wine got us an even larger portion of the mussels! Yum. The tapas that we ordered were also wonderful. Finally tapas the way we thought they should be!
The next day, most of the group went to a Moroccan restaurant for lunch. They seated us in the upstairs dining room and we had the room to ourselves. The waiter just brought us an assortment of foods to try. It was a great way to sample a lot of dishes, but it was nearly impossible to know the name of the dish. So, there’s no way to order it again. Oh well, it was all fantastic, so it probably doesn’t matter what it’s called.
Finally, the highlight of Granada and the real reason that people come here was the Alhambra. The Alhambra was the Moorish Palace until the Crusaders conquered Spain. Then it became the Palace for Charles V. It’s a huge complex on a hilltop with gorgeous gardens and fresh cool breezes. The Moorish Palace still has the original stucco work complete with the colorful paint. The gardens were built after the Moors and were like an English garden. It’s really hard to describe such a large complex, so if you ever get to Spain, this is one of the places to see. You have to plan ahead, though. Tickets are all sold in advance.
That evening, we had a group dinner at a restaurant with a view of the Alhambra. After dinner, one of the guys in the group provided some entertainment. As a high school student, he played Don Quixote’s sidekick in The Man of La Mancha and he actually remembered one or two of the songs. The whole time he was singing, our tour guide was panicking that we would be kicked out! But our singer was pretty good and everyone was having fun.
So, the bottom line on Granada is great food and the fabulous Alhambra all in a dirty city with bad atmosphere.
We arrived in Granada in time for a walking tour and dinner. Granada, in the south of Spain, is the gateway to Morocco. The Moroccan influence was obvious in the restaurants and souvenir stores. The smell of incense poured out of all the little souvenir stores. The streets were narrow and dirty. There were lots of homeless people and weird looking hippies. Lots of them had scraggy-looking dogs. I really did not like this city. But it did have some redeeming factors.
For dinner, Dennis and I went to a wine bar. Granada is one of the last cities to serve tapas free with your drinks. Our tour guide advised us to keep an eye on what other people were getting and make sure you get the same. At our wine bar, we sat right at the bar so we could ask the bar tender about the wines. We ordered a glass each and we got our tapa – a toothpick with a grape and a square of cheese. OK, that’s a bit underwhelming. But we saw the chef deliver a platter with a gorgeous seafood salad (mussels, carrots, red peppers in vinaigrette). With my great high-school Spanish, I asked the bartender, “Que es esto?” With that, he gave us each a small serving of the salad. We ordered a few other tapas off the menu, too. The menu for once was understandable and the prices were listed clearly as well. Another glass of wine got us an even larger portion of the mussels! Yum. The tapas that we ordered were also wonderful. Finally tapas the way we thought they should be!
The next day, most of the group went to a Moroccan restaurant for lunch. They seated us in the upstairs dining room and we had the room to ourselves. The waiter just brought us an assortment of foods to try. It was a great way to sample a lot of dishes, but it was nearly impossible to know the name of the dish. So, there’s no way to order it again. Oh well, it was all fantastic, so it probably doesn’t matter what it’s called.
Finally, the highlight of Granada and the real reason that people come here was the Alhambra. The Alhambra was the Moorish Palace until the Crusaders conquered Spain. Then it became the Palace for Charles V. It’s a huge complex on a hilltop with gorgeous gardens and fresh cool breezes. The Moorish Palace still has the original stucco work complete with the colorful paint. The gardens were built after the Moors and were like an English garden. It’s really hard to describe such a large complex, so if you ever get to Spain, this is one of the places to see. You have to plan ahead, though. Tickets are all sold in advance.
That evening, we had a group dinner at a restaurant with a view of the Alhambra. After dinner, one of the guys in the group provided some entertainment. As a high school student, he played Don Quixote’s sidekick in The Man of La Mancha and he actually remembered one or two of the songs. The whole time he was singing, our tour guide was panicking that we would be kicked out! But our singer was pretty good and everyone was having fun.
So, the bottom line on Granada is great food and the fabulous Alhambra all in a dirty city with bad atmosphere.
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