Planning a 2 week trip to Spain/ Ireland. This will be our first to Spain and second to Ireland. Would love to see Granada (friends) and either Madrid or Barcelona and on to Ireland. Hoping for 5 days in Spain and 9 in Ireland ( plus travel days). We go from crack of dawn til we are ready to drop love days filled with fun food locals and everything in between. What can you recommend especially Spain. I know Ireland won't be a pronlem.
Posted by
Brisbane, Australia
7175 posts
It's nice to see you are interested in visiting Spain. But only five days? That's a bit of a backhander. With only 2 weeks choose one or the other, Ireland or Spain.
Posted by
CA, USA
266 posts
If I had to pick one city in Spain to visit it would be Barcelona or Seville. I know lots of people like Madrid, but I am not one of them (been there twice).
Posted by
OP
17 posts
We plan on seeing friends in Spain and dropping our daughter in Ireland for the semester. Meeting family in Ireland to tour them around. A bit complicated but Spain is actually a quick add on as long as we are so close??
Posted by
CA, USA
266 posts
If your friends are in Granada, it is very easy to hop on a bus to Seville. Granada to Barcelona is more involved/longer.
Posted by
Brisbane, Australia
7175 posts
I'm assuming you are in USA or Canada. If your friends are in Granada then note that you won't find direct flights to get you there from Ireland. You will find Madrid/Barcelona are your long haul gateways from North America, while Seville has limited direct services from Dublin.
My suggestion would be to ...
Fly N America to Madrid
Train to Granada
Train to Seville
Fly to Dublin
Fly to N America
However, you would need to alter the balance and give more time to Spain. Ireland is a very small European country, while Spain is very large.
Posted by
Germany
1117 posts
Spain is actually a quick add on as long as we are so close
"So close"? :D That sure is a matter of perspective!
With five days in Spain and friends to visit, there's not going to be much room for anything else. Out of your five days, you'll waste one whole day on traveling if you are actually going to split that between two of those cities. I'd stay in one place and go from there. Either focus on a city trip to Madrid OR Barcelona, or make that a visit to Andalucia.
Personally, if I had two weeks of vacation, I'd choose between EITHER Ireland OR Spain, but certainly not both in one trip. As a matter of fact, I'd consider Andalucia alone to be worth a two weeks' stay, without even side tripping to Madrid or Barcelona.
Posted by
Bloomington, IL, USA
9363 posts
Having just returned from my fifth visit to Spain, I agree that five days just isn't worth doing. You will be spending extra money, time, and complexity to see virtually nothing. I have been to Ireland four times, and think you could easily spend the extra days better in Ireland. Save Spain for a time when you can do it justice.