Hello, we are planning a trip to Spain for March 2024. This would be our first visit. Ideally, we'd like to focus on Seville and Andalucia as we figure the weather should be drier than Madrid. However, we are open to basing out of Madrid instead. We would have two adults and our eight year old son (his first European trip, but an otherwise good flyer/traveler). With work, school, and flight schedules, we'll probably only have seven actual visit days (land on Friday, fly out on Friday). We will be flying from the US via American/Iberia. We can't make a return flight from Seville because of a short 65 minutes connection at MAD before any flights back to US. Of these current flight options, which would you recommend?
1) Fly in/out of Madrid, arriving very early into Madrid at 5:45 AM. We could train to Seville, stay there four or five nights, then back to Madrid for two or three nights. Or we could base out Madrid and do Toledo or elsewhere for some nights out of town.
2) Fly into Jerez/out of Madrid. Jerez flight would connect via MAD and arrive at 8:35 AM. Would 100 minutes be enough time for immigration and flight connection in MAD? We could train directly to Seville for four/five nights, then back to Madrid for three/two nights.
3) Fly into Granada/out of Madrid. Arrive into Granada at 9:20 AM with a 2.5 hour connection at MAD. Two nights Granada, three nights Seville, two nights Madrid.
These two options are $300 - $400 more than the above three.
4) Fly into Jerez/out of Granada. This would allow us to maximize time in Andalucia. However, both the inbound and outbound connections at MAD are 100 minutes. Is this enough connection time?
5) Fly into Madrid/out of Granada. This would be the same 100 minute connection GRX - MAD - US flights.
Thank you to anyone who made it through the above post. Again, this would be our first trip to Spain, so we're excited to visit somewhere new and not necessarily tied down to any specific itinerary. Any and all advice is appreciated!