Portugal is the first new country we’ve visited since the beginning of COVID and we were very excited to experience a new place. We weren’t sure how similar or different Portugal would feel from Spain. After all, they’re close neighbors. However, we quickly learned they are very different and as much as we love Spain,…
Sunny (and hot!) Seville
We spent a terrific (but toasty) five days in Seville as we made our way from Ronda to Portugal. Five days was just enough time to get to know the city, see the main sites, and fall a little bit in love with Seville. Plus eat lots of tapas and try the famous regional vino…
Porto: We’re Home
I’m going to keep this short because I’m very behind on the blog and also have lots of work things going on, and we’re trying to get out a lot to enjoy Porto. But so far, so good here! Here are some things we’re enjoying already about Porto. Public Transit Soon after arriving, we decided…
Ronda Romantica
Ronda wound up being everything we hoped for in a four-week stay. As I said in my Ronda: We’re Home post, we chose it because the elevation meant it was a bit cooler in June and July than most of Spain. This proved to be true throughout the four weeks and we were able to…
Malaga on the Sea
After Granada, Sara, Chad, and I hopped on a bus and headed even farther south to the coast and the city of Malaga. It was not our best bus experience. There were two buses headed for Malaga at the same time and the Granada station mislabeled which bay each would be in. The resulting confusion…
Granada and the Alhambra
The day after Sara joined us in Madrid, we all got on a train to head south to Granada. The lure of Granada is that it is home to an incredible medieval Islamic palace and fortress complex called the Alhambra. It is one of the most popular tourist attractions in Spain and was at the…
Ronda: We’re Home
Though I still have a post or two to catch up about our earlier Spain travels, I want to go ahead and record my early impressions of our long stay location, Ronda. Ronda is one of the white villages of Andalusia, the southern region of Spain that was controlled by the Moors until the 15th…
A Day in Alcala de Henares
A day trip is a great way to see more places without the hassle of checking into a new place. We took several of them during our last stint in Europe. And Madrid offers many great day trip options: Toledo, Avila, Segovia. But since we wanted a place as easy to reach as possible, in…
Mad About Madrid
We’re back in Europe again! This time we’re spending three months in Spain and Portugal, beginning with a week in Madrid. We really loved the city and plan to go back someday for a full month. But our week there was enough to see how wonderfully liveable the city is – though maybe not so…
Arkansas Interlude
I’m writing this post from Madrid, which we love, and posting it from Granada, which is a very impressive place. So I have to admit, we like traveling to Europe so much better than anywhere we travel in the U.S. But we take one little American vacation to celebrate Chad’s birthday and our four-year travel-versary…