Need advice with visiting both Segovia and Avila from Madrid

It doesn't take much time to see Avila. As far as I'm concerned, there's the wall (which you can walk on) and not much else. There's definitely more to see in Segovia. I might recommend 3 nights rather than 4 in Segovia, but perhaps someone else can come up with an additional small town or two you can have in your hip pocket if you end up with too much time there.

Another possibility would be to spend your last night in Alcala de Henares. It's an old university town with a very attractive historic center that's not far from the airport. You could choose how early on that last day to travel from Segovia to Alcala, based on how your sightseeing in the Segovia area is going.

Hi Jaice,

Four nights is too much for Segovia. We did it as a day trip from Madrid. We took the bus but
you can also take the train. We have not been to Avila but I would take the train there as well. The price of rental cars is through the roof right now as is gas in Europe. And then there is the hassle of parking, tolls, etc. Spain has wonderful public transportation. Unless you are exploring the countryside, you don’t need a car in Spain.

I agree with acraven (as usual) - Avila is all about the wall, it's a fun stop and worth playing around up on it for a while, but other than that, we didn't find the place particularly special. Definitely would allocate more time for Segovia, since there's much more to see there (not sure it warrants 4 days, though). We did Avila as a stop on the way from Toledo to Segovia, and it worked perfectly as a mid-day leg-stretcher (good workout huffing up and down all the stairs on the wall). We had a rented car (I do not know if the train is an easy/good option for Avila - it might be, but we had a car).

But since you have plenty of days here (in/near Madrid) I gotta ask...hopefully, you already are including an overnight stop in Toledo...and specifically spending an overnight there, rather than doing a day-trip to Toledo amongst the crowds? I ask because an overnight in Toledo is so much better than a mid-day day-trip there (a mistake which almost every tourist visiting Spain makes). You have enough "days" in/around Madrid to do Toledo as an overnight.

You can (and probably should) take the fast, efficient trains between Madrid and Segovia, and (if you go) between Madrid and Toledo. If Toledo is not already in your plans, consider this: take the train from Madrid to Toledo, arrive in the afternoon. Note the discouraging crowds. Then note how those same crowds melt away late in the afternoon, as they all pile back into their bus or train returning to Madrid for the night. Enjoy magical Toledo at its best, free of crowds, late afternoon, into the evening, and sleep there. Get up early the next morning, savor the quiet, lovely old city center sharing it with just the locals in the morning hours. Then as the tour buses roll in, and the trains show up, and all the day-trippers fill the streets, jump in your rented car by 10 am, and head out.

We drove from Toledo to Avila, spent a couple hours playing on the wall, then drove on to Segovia, dropped our car there, and enjoyed the city for a couple nights (like Toledo, it gets crowded during mid day, for the same reason: it's so easy to access from Madrid that most tourists do that, with predictable results). When you're done with Segovia, take the train back to Madrid.

Both Toledo and Segovia are being "loved to death" (like many other magical places in Europe). They are at their best if you spend your time there when the day-tripper crowds have all gone home. That just requires inverting the schedule a bit, and spending the night there. Both cities are lovely when the crowds predictably disappear.

Hope that helps.

Ditto what has been said about Ávila. To me it’s worth a couple hours at most. Segovia is worth a couple full days, meaning 3 nights. If you have a car, parking is tight in both places. In Ávila one can usually find a parking spot on the road surrounding the town. A good view of the walls and town is from the Cuatro Postes overlook. For Segovia, reserve a hotel that has parking. You’ll probably have to pay 15€-20€ a night to park. The Parador there has free parking, but it isn’t in the historic center either. For as few miles as you’ll be putting on the car, fuel won’t break the bank, so don’t make your decision based on the fuel prices. If you rent a vehicle soon, you can still get some pretty goods deals. The closer to September it gets, the more expensive a car will get.

If you had a car and enjoy castles, there are ones in Medina Del Campo, Coca, Arévalo, Cuéllar, Portillo, Pedraza, and Peñafiel. To me, the ones at Medino Del Campo, Coca, are Peñafiel were the most impressive. The Convento de Santa Clara in Tordesillas was very nice. There’s a museum near the convent related to the Treaty of Tordesillas as it was signed there. The 1494 treaty divided the newly discovered lands outside Europe between the Portuguese Empire and the Spanish Empire. The town itself is small. If you don’t see storks in Ávila, you can see plenty of them in Olmedo. La Granja near Segovia has a couple sights (Fuente de la Cascada Nueva, The Baths of Diana) and would be worth walking around for a short while.

I agree with acraven about spending your last night in Alcalá de Henares. If you still have the rental car, the Parador in the town has paid private parking. The town is on the same side of Madrid as the airport, so getting to the airport would be easier than if you stayed on the western city of Madrid.