Riding the Trolley Car in Porto, Portugal
When Thom and I left home three months ago I never planned to write about our travels. So even though I took my computer with me, I wanted complete freedom to take the summer off from writing if I didn’t feel I had anything to say or share. But if you’ve been following along then you know that several weeks after leaving home, I challenged myself to write a post that included a few photos and thoughts about our travels up to that point. Ten posts later, we finally wrap up our trip spending both a week in Porto and a week in Lisbon, Portugal. Our time in both locations gave us an opportunity to settle into each city and reflect on our trip. And as usual when our travels draw to a close, we began to look forward to returning to our lives back home. [Read more…]
Our final destination in Spain is Seville. There is a great deal written about how wonderful the city is in books and on the internet so I decided we should stay here for a week. I found another great apartment in a central location and after visiting Ronda we drove our car into town (only getting lost once or twice) and turned it into the rental agency. All good. Once settled in we headed out to explore. Surprisingly because it doesn’t get dark there until after 10:00 p.m., it seems pretty natural to wait until 7:00-8:00 to eat. That of course is still early for Spaniards who typically wait until 10:00 to eat, but it worked just fine for us. We relaxed the first day in town (did some laundry) and prepared for our tour of the Real Alcazar–The Royal Palace–the following day. 
One of the main reasons I wanted to visit Spain was to experience Andalucía in the Southern part of the country. For whatever reason I felt drawn to the culture and landscape. Past lives? Who knows? But after experiencing Barcelona we took the train to Cordoba before taking another train to Granada. The highlight there, at least in my opinion, is the Alhambra. This palace and former fortress is considered to be one of the most famous examples of Islamic architecture and one of the best-preserved palaces of the historic Islamic world. Plus, it contains notable examples of Spanish Renaissance design. Sitting boldly on a hill overlooking Granada, it is a must see when visiting. And I purposely selected a vacation rental that provided a view.