Sunday 1st May 2011
Friday night we booked a Flamenco show and dinner, the bus picked us up outside the Campsite and we were taken to a restaurant in the Gypsy district to a Cave built into the side of the hill. We had a nice 3 course dinner with drinks included. Ewout and I both had the lamb shoulder which was delicious and tender. The show of course had lots of dancing and energetic music which was well worth seeing. We were supposed to also go for a walk around the streets of the Albayzin, which is the oldest part of the city, and to see night views of the Alhambra but it was raining and everyone seemed to want to go back to their lodgings. (us included)
Saturday morning we did some washing and made use of the internet to talk to our family in Australia then caught the bus into the City of Granada. We had plenty of time to look around as we had tickets into the Palace of the Nasrid at 6.30 pm which luckily we had booked when we arrived at the campsite on Thursday night. Tickets are quite hard to get and you have to pre-book them if you want to see the Nasrid Palace.
We got off the bus in the city and had no map and no idea where to go so we thought we should head to the city centre and see if we could find a tourist information place. We wandered through the shopping streets and made our way towards the large church in the middle, as we came to a large square Ewout decided to ask a lady sitting in a booth. As luck would have it she was an information person and she had a map and gave us some advice as to where we should go. So armed with our map and some helpful advice we set of, first to have a coffee and get our bearings then off through the Albayzin which is the oldest part of the city and has a distinctive Moorish feel to it. We wandered the narrow streets and worked our way up the hill to a small park where we stopped and ate our packed lunch. It had been raining on and off but luckily had stopped for a bit while we ate and enjoyed the views across the city and of the Alhambra. We then continued walking until we came to the main vantage point of the area with a wonderful view of the Alhambra, we could see all the people walking around on the ramparts and we asked a couple from England to take a photo of us with the view in the background. Then it was off down the winding cobbled streets back to find a Taxi or bus to take us up the other hill to the entrance of the Alhambra. We found a taxi but it seemed an exorbitant fare so decided that we would walk up ourselves, (good exercise).
After going in the wrong direction for a bit we got our bearings and headed up the hill, it was quite steep going but some of the way was through beautiful parkland and they had lots of places to stop and sit and rest. It didn’t take too long though and we really only had to stop and sit to take a photo of the benches as it showed how steep the path was. (See photos) We made it up to the monument and after finding we couldn’t get into the Alcazbar without our official ticket (we had a piece of paper from the campsite which we had to exchange) we walked all the way to the other end where the ticket office was. Here we found a long line up waiting to purchase tickets, we weren’t sure whether we should get in line or not but thought that if I (Jenny) got in line then Ewout could go about and get some information. Finally after a bit of running around he came back with the tickets so we could go back and enter the places that we paid for. We first went to the General life area and were impressed with garden and intricate pebble paths, and then we wandered through the Palace of the Kings of Granada before making our way down back towards the Alcazaba. It entailed quite a lot of walking so we stopped and had coffee in a very fancy cafeteria where it was bliss to sit down in a comfortable arm chair.
After visiting the Alcazaba we finally got to see the Nasrid Palaces, three palaces built in different periods interspersed with beautiful gardens and water features.
So much to take in and finally we had had enough, all very awe-inspiring but time to head back to camp. Exhausted and hungry we made it back by bus, had a quiet meal of soup, bread and cheese, we watched an internet download of Rock Wiz and went to bed.
