Planning Spring visit. Planning on starting in
Santiago de Compostela (3 nights)
Fly to Barcelona 4 nights
Valencia/Alicante 2 nights
Granada by train 3 nights
Seville 3 nights
Madrid 4 nights.
Is this duable?
Don’t want to do a Chevy Chase European vacation by rushing to much.
The first thing that pops out at me as worthy of possible reconsideration is the 2-night stop in Valencia or Alicante. (I think Valencia would be more interesting.) It's going to cost you a great deal of extra travel time and give you not all that much sightseeing time. The train network between Valencia/Alicante and Granada is not good. The fastest route runs through Madrid. And you could certainly use those two nights in other places. You don't have enough time penciled in for a day-trip to Cordoba from Seville, and I'd argue that 3 nights is short just for Seville. For me, extra time in Barcelona, Seville or Cordoba would be more worthwhile than a bit of time in Valencia or Alicante, especially given how much time you'll be sitting on trains or buses to make it work.
Are you a big art fan? If not, do you have plans for a side-trip or two while you're in Madrid? To me it's not nearly as interesting a city as many other places in Spain unless you want to spend a lot of time in its art museums. However, there are some great day-trips from Madrid: Toledo, Segovia, Cuenca and others. If you for some reason don't want to do day-trips from Madrid and also don't much care for art, I think 4 days is too long to stay there.
Can you be more precise about the timing of your trip? Late March is quite different from mid-June. Andalucía can get very hot by June. Santiago de Compostela is notorious for its overcast, rainy weather and might be quite chilly and damp in March.
I see a glaring omission: you don’t have Córdoba on your itinerary, which is a very important city historically and culturally. While you could see Córdoba as a day trip from Seville, I highly recommend spending 1 or 2 nights in Córdoba. There is a lot more to Córdoba than just the Mezquita.
I would delete Valencia from your itinerary and add those 2 nights to Córdoba.
While 3 nights is nice for Granada, I would take one of those nights and add it to Seville. Seville is a larger city than Granada with more to see.
I really like Madrid! We had 4 nights there and were never bored, but we did spend a lot of time in the Prado and Reina Sofia. If you are not a big art fan, you could spend 3 nights in Madrid and one night in Toledo. However, if that is too much moving around for you, then by all means visit Toledo as a day trip.
Santiago de Compostela seems like a bit of an geographic outlier, how will you be getting there? Are there direct flights from where you are coming from?
I meant to mention that the airport in Vigo might be a possible landing point, but it could be a lot more expensive than flying to Barcelona or Madrid. In any case, Vigo is not a city worth your time, so try to avoid having to spend a night there. Not a bad place, just dull (by the standards of Spain).
Thank you guys for your suggestions..
We plan to fly in from Paris so thats why we thought starting in SANTIAGO DE COMPOSTELA and working our way around. My days are not set but it looks like arriving in Spain April 18 or 19th.
My husband and I like museums and enjoy the outdoors and of course we are foodies.
Would it be better to start in Madrid and work down to Seville, Granada and end in Barcelona? Trains and Planes suggestions?
Thanks
To add to the options, you can fly from Santiago (or Paris?) to Seville or Malaga. So it would be possible to start south and work north.
I think the key question is where do you need to be at the end to fly home? If it's a Spanish airport such as Madrid then you might want to end there. If it's via another British/European country, it might not matter as you'll need a connecting flight anyway and these are possible from most parts of Spain.
If all options are on the table you could go from Paris to Andalucia, then fly to Galicia, then fly to Barcelona and finally a train back to Madrid. But I'm just making that up since I don't know where, if anywhere, is already fixed.
Valencia is wonderful, but not - in my view - necessarily a priority for a first visit. Alacant is fine, but after the castle not a great deal to see (even Murcia province is better!). Since you mentioned it first, I'm assuming SantiagoDeC is a must for you. If not, it would make an easier routing to exclude it this time.
So we plan on flying into Paris via UNITED AIRLINES and departing back to the USA from Madrid on UNITED AIRLINES.
I can fly out from Madrid or Barcelona to the USA. I can also rearange this intire Itinerary. SUGGESTIONS PLEASE!
Spain for 21 DAYS
April 15 Paris for 3 nights *
considering taking train from Paris to San Sabastian, Spain to enjoy the train scenery.
April 18th for San Sabastian, Spain 3 nights
April 21st Bilbao 2 nights
April 23 fly to Santiago de Compostela 3 nights
April 26th Fly to Barcelona 4 nights (day trip to Girona)
April 30th Granada 3 nights
Granada by train I was told in the long run is faster than flying.
May 3rd Seville 3 nights
May 6th Madrid 3 nights (day trip to Toledo)
May 7th return to USA
