Need thoughts and suggestions on my Spain Itinerary - This is long.

It appears that this a first trip so I would suggest that you omit Portugal and return there when you can devote more time to it.

You are omitting several great possibilities in Spain. Particularly Toledo and I think Madrid needs more time.

Drop the car at the airport at Seville. Stay in the old part of Seville and you can easily walk everywhere that you will want to go. Driving in Seville is VERY difficult and you will waste lots of time trying to figure it out. Then there will be parking issue. No need for the car in either Seville or Madrid. If you do elect to include Toledo, leave the car on the outskirts.

I tend to agree with George...drop Portugal and spend more time in Madrid. It's a wonderful city that's worth a good stop. I would also say that 4 days in Marbella is probably going to be too much time. In November, there won't be anything going on there....and it's a bit of a "flashy" rich town to begin with. If you must stay along the coast, choose Nerja for a day or 2, just south of Granada. I'd also drop Cadiz....it'll be cold off the Atlantic that time of year, and I never really saw much in Cadiz anyway that would keep me there. Visit Cordoba on the way to Madrid....the fast train only takes 2:40 to make it all the way from Sevilla to Madrid, so you can easily leave early in the morning, visit Cordoba, and be in Madrid that evening.And I echo George's comments to drop the car as soon as you get into Sevilla....the traffic can be awful. Drop it at the airport or train station, then cab it into the old part of the city.

I agree with the others, but would go further: I think your itinerary is wildly unrealistic, and you spend time in the wrong places (for my tastes at least). By all means, give Madrid at least 2 or 3 days - it's one of the great cities of Europe (on a par with Paris or Rome). A few hours on the day you arrive from the US doesn't count (you'll be jet-lagged, groggy and disoriented). I'd suggest you skip Portugal, and skip Tangier entirely (seriously? you have what, 2 weeks!). Personally, I'd skip the Costa del Sol (aka Costa de Tourismo), too (if you must, a short visit to Nerja will let you cross that off your list). And you can't "do" the "white hill towns, etc." in one day (maybe drive by and take your picture outside town, but what a waste!); you really need to spend the night in 1 or 2 of them to really appreciate them, they're magical. I'd give them 2-3 days minimum.

I would do without the car entirely, except for the white hill towns (you need a car to do them); elsewhere, a car would just be a major headache. Trains are great, and for some stretches either fly (Barcelona - Madrid) or take a bus if there's no direct connection (some parts of Andalucia).

Since your time is limited, I'd stick to Barcelona, Madrid, and Andalucia (Toledo, maybe Sevilla, Granada, maybe Cordoba, white hill towns). With 2 weeks, there's plenty to see and do there. Save Portugal and Morocco for another trip.

Sorry, I'm sure this isn't what you want to hear (but you did ask...), I just think you're being completely unrealistic. And I say that as someone who usually does a complete Rick Steves-style "blitz" trip, with too many things packed in for most people's tastes.

Good luck no matter what you decide.

David, you just saved my fingers the effort, by nicely echoing my own thoughts.

Thank you all for your comments and suggestions. One of the reasons we want to do Alahambra and also Tangiers is because my son will be with us for those nights and being that he is doing the whole semester in Barcelona he will already have been to Madrid and Toledo. So I wanted to spend 3 nights in places where he has not been.
We also are not much for going to art museums or those kind of things. We pretty much like architecture, natural sites and anything with water.
We do also like wineries.
So taking that into consideration do you think my plan seems okay.

Also, since we are there for 2.5 weeks, I did not want to wear us out. Maybe a day or two in there to just relax someplace and enjoy the local atmosphere.

The place I actually am looking at staying in the Costa Del Sol is in a place called "Puerto Cabopino". It is a condo rental. Is this an okay location?
Thanks again so much.
Mary

We did Barcelona, Andalusia, and Madrid this past May. The train from Barcelona to Granada is an overnight train. By car it is a looooong drive, probably needing an overnight along the way. We found the best way to get to Andalusia was to fly to Malaga (on Spanair and it was cheap and fast) and rent a car.

From Malaga we drove to Granada (about 2 hours). Or from Malaga to Marbella doesn't take too long, as it's all freeway.

Since you are going in late November you need to keep in mind that your days are not as long. You might want to check out what time the sun is up and down before planning. But,if you set out early morning from Marbella you could visit Ronda (considered, along with Arcos, one of the main white villages in the area). It takes about an hour, maybe a bit longer if trafficy, and it's a windy road. (Note: If you take this route, when you near Ronda you'll see two signs for Ronda, take the one which says "Sur Ronda" (the road left) and it takes you right to the old town. The road from Ronda to one of the other small villages shouldn't take long (good roads), but if you are not overnighting up there you may want to return before dark because you've got to go back down that windy mountain road.

We originally planned to drive into Seville so we chose a hotel in the Triana which had parking. The Triana area is also an "easier" (maybe the wrong term) area to drive in than across the river and into the historic center of Seville. However, in the end we opted for the easy out and dropped our car at the airport and took a taxi to our hotel (about €25-30, as I recall). Worth it! If you get a hotel in the Bario area, don't even think car or parking.

Anyway, hope there something helpful here. :)

I would still echo David's comments. Having been to Tangiers I can say I am glad I had the opportunity, but I will never return to that location in Morocco. It will leave a bad taste in your mouth when Morocco offers to much more and would demand more time in the future.

You are attempting to cover a lot of ground. There is something worthwhile about saying you been somewhere, but there is even more value in knowing a place and having memories to share from having been there. Enjoy a grand adventure; they are never marathons.

I still think your plans are misguided and unrealistic, and will result in what I refer to as a "cruise ship travel experience" at best (note: this is not a compliment), that is a two-week series of miserable slogs from one hotel to another, while you miss all the good stuff.

Be realistic. You have a total of 14 days. You say you're there for "2.5 weeks." Not if you count honestly. You can NOT count the day you arrive (you'll be a zombie after an overnight flight and all the disorientation of flying half-way round the world to a foreign country), nor can you count the day you leave. In fact, many people are still half zonked-out the day AFTER they arrive, too, so it's wise to plan for a light day on your first (honest) day there, too. Maybe you're different, but I think most people underestimate how much the flight across the world and radical time zone change takes out of them. If you're speaking from experience, fine, but if you've never flown half-way across the planet before...

Remember: any day when you're going from one location to another, you lose at least half that day (maybe the whole day). Forget Morocco. Forget Portugal - that's crazy talk. With just two weeks, pick 3 or 4 or a maximum of 5 places - otherwise you will spend ALL your time checking out, getting to the next place, getting lost, finding your way, checking in, getting oriented, finding a place to eat, etc. This stuff takes time - a lot more time than most people think it will.

For most all of this region, driving from one place to another is a really bad idea - you really do NOT want a car in the large/old cities. The only part where you will need a car is touring around Andalucia/white hill towns.

You will have to reconcile the different interests of all those traveling, but just because your child had been to Paris before (and you had not), would you really skip it entirely?

I agree with most that your plans are unrealistic and crammed with too much travel and not enough seeing anything. Spend at 2 nights in Madrid, skip the driving into France, don't rent the car until you're done with the Alhambra....it's much easier to use public transport in Granada than to drive avoiding the congestion zones. I will disagree with others however on skipping Tangier.
We stayed in Tarifa for 2 nights (about 10 days ago) and day tripped to Tangier, using the excellent guide Aziz mentioned in RS's Spain book. He arranged for our ferry tickets and met us just past customs in Tangier, and took us for a relaxed, personal, un-touristy tour of his beloved city with no one pulling on our sleeves or making the big sell. It was probably the most memorable day of our 2-week Spain trip (& the rest was wonderful), but mainly because Aziz made it so, by helping avoid the hard-sells. You really must book a reputable guide if you do this day trip. We met others during our time in Spain that tried doing the same trip but without a recommended guide and experienced night-mares. Tarifa was also wonderful, very beachy and relaxed, and preferable to Marbella & its traffic,etc. in my opinion.

I personally found the river-side stuff in Sevilla disappointing but absolutely loved the old Jewish quarter. Do not try to drive in Sevilla. We picked up a rental car there, but only at the end of our stay and we took a taxi back to the station to pick up the car. Sevilla itself is quite manageable on foot with an occasional taxi. Hope this helps a little.

Thanks everyone for your suggestions. I will take them all into consideration.

I do want to mention that the reason we are only spending 1 night in Madrid is because I will be too anxious to see my son after not seeing him for 4 months. We fly into Madrid but then really want to just get to Barcelona.

Then after we spend the week in Barcelona with him we want to take him to places where he has not been with his classes, which will be in southern spain.

So with that said, I just don't see a way for us to spend more time in Madrid. Or would all of you recommend more nights in Madrid instead of Seville?
That would be the only way we could change our itinerary.

Also, has anyone ever heard of the place in Costa Del Sol is called "Puerto Cabopino". It is a condo rental. Is this an okay location? Thanks again so much. Mary

You've received good advice, from many people, and it's pretty consistent. You ignore it, and ask again. Are you expecting a different answer?

I think your plans are a recipe for misery, and a waste of two weeks in a beautiful country that you're going to miss, while instead you experience a two-week blur that consists of a mass-market manufactured tourist experience (the "costa del sol"), and a lot of checking in and out of hotels.

You seem to feel you know better, so you're going to skip the great cities of Spain and spend your time driving to and from a condo that might as well be in Miami or LA. Fine, that's your choice. But if you keep asking the same question and you keep getting the same answer, why ask it again?

Sorry if that sounds harsh, but your plans seem very misguided to me, and you don't seem to want to hear the advice you say you're asking for. Are you sure you really want "thoughts and suggestions on my Spain Itinerary." Doesn't look like it to me...