We (husband, son age 20, myself) took a quick 7-day trip to Spain last month, based mainly in Cadiz, with overnights in Cordoba and Madrid. We only had a week because of work commitments, and I had vowed that come hell or high water our next vacation would be a return to Spain (third time for husband and son, fifth time for me), so we decided a short trip was better than none (even though some might say Andalusia in summer is a sample of hell....).
We had spent a few days in Cadiz during our last Spain trip in January 2022, and loved the town; just the right size for us, not too crowded, friendly people, slow pace, fantastic food (especially the seafood!), great for walking/chilling. There aren’t many “sites,” but we were looking mostly for downtime this trip and Cadiz was perfect.
Itinerary:
Saturday 6/27 – fly Burlington, VT to JFK, overnight to Madrid
Sunday 6/28 – land in Madrid, taxi to Atocha, train to Cordoba, arrive 3:30-ish
Monday 6/29 – 1 p.m. train to Cadiz, arrive 4-ish
Tuesday 6/30 – Cadiz
Wednesday 7/1 – rent car, day trip to Gibraltar, sleep in Cadiz
Thursday 7/2 – Cadiz
Friday 7/3 – 1 p.m. train to Madrid, arrive 6-ish
Saturday 7/4 – fly Madrid to JFK to Burlington
Arrival
Our plane landed at 09:30 in Madrid and we were outside at the taxi line by 10:15. Note that my son is disabled and uses a special needs stroller, so we were taken through a priority line to get through immigration. Our passports were hand-processed and we did not use the EES kiosks. We were at Atocha by 10:45, with plenty of time to grab breakfast at a nearby restaurant and catch our 13:35 train to Cordoba. Because of our first class train tickets, we had access to the Sala lounge at Atocha for the hour prior to boarding; this was sooooo much nicer than the hot crush inside the station.
Trains
I purchased all train tickets on Renfe’s website. Per my usual experience with Renfe, my first couple of credit card transactions worked flawlessly and the next,,,, did not. No apparent reason, the card just wouldn’t go through. So I used PayPal instead, which (as always) worked. I just never seem to remember to start with PayPal in the first place.
I have learned that first class train seating is easier to navigate when we are traveling with a mobility-challenged person and wrangling a stroller plus luggage. There are fewer people, the aisles are wider, and it’s just easier to stow the stuff and get to the seat without a crush. In most places, including Spain, purchasing tickets well in advance makes first class reasonably priced, so this is how we roll when we travel by train.
For the first time in Spain, I requested boarding assistance from Renfe when I booked the train tickets. My son can walk, but is slow and uncoordinated. We’ve done a lot of train travel with him throughout Europe, and while we can get him on and off the train ourselves, it always feels like there’s a time pressure to get on and get him to a seat before the train starts moving. We traveled in England last year and tried using passenger assistance for the first time; we found it a great help to have train staff right there to ease the time crunch for boarding and disembarking.
Our Renfe passenger assistance experience was good and we found it helpful especially for boarding. For getting off the train, often a single staff person was responsible for helping multiple passengers, so rather than waiting for the staff person, we just helped my son off the train ourselves. But it was still nice to know that we had plenty of time to get him down.
Our actual travel experience on the trains was fine. It did seem like the trains were a bit shabbier than our last visit, and pretty much all trains were late on the days we traveled (not just our trains, but all the trains on the board). But we got where we needed and did not have any unpleasant experiences.