Spain Trip 2013: General Observations

I think one of the first conversations that Doug and I had when we started dating was "where are we going for our first big trip?" It didn't take us long to decide on Spain- he'd never been and I'd only visited Barcelona.

We decided to spend 16 days there, stopping in Barcelona, Madrid, Sevilla, and Granada with day trips to Toledo, Segovia, and Cordoba (see our full itinerary below). 

I plan to blog about our favorite sites, restaurants, and bars in each city but first, some general recommendations/observations about our travels in Spain: 

1) Buy Rick Steves' book. His guide was an invaluable resource when it came to both planning our trip and exploring and eating while we were there.

2) Airbnb is awesome. As travelers on a budget, we basically had two choices for lodging: hostels or Airbnb. We chose Airbnb for our nights in Barcelona, Sevilla, and Granada and could not have been more happy with that decision. Yes, there were a few funky things here and there, like lots and lots of stairs and a slightly confusing building (were we staying in a real estate office or what?), but for the most part, great locations and our own bathrooms and kitchens made it worth it.

3) Restaurant service is much different. In Spain, servers are there to take your order, bring your food, and give you your check. And that's about it. They're not there to make you feel comfortable or check in with you, and you're certainly not getting your bill until you manage to flag someone down with a "la cuenta, por favor." This definitely took some getting used to for us.

4) Take advantage of the Renfe train system. We used Renfe for all our city-to-city travels. It was reliable, fast, and relatively cheap. Plus, as Doug pointed out, Renfe trains kind of have a Darkwing Duck thing going on.

5) Spaniards are serious about siesta. I don't know why this was surprising to me since siesta is probably the first thing you learn about Spanish culture in elementary school, but for some reason I was thinking it was more of a cliche than an actual thing. But really, the smaller towns and even the larger cities to some extent do shut down from about 3-6pm. As Doug and I eventually learned, it makes a lot more sense to partake in this custom rather than wandering around trying to find something that's open.

6) Jamon is everywhere. I thought people were joking when they told us to be prepared to eat a lot of jamon. But they weren't joking... and neither am I when I say I've had enough cured ham for quite some time.

7) Be prepared to stay out late. Another cliche that we saw in action time and time again was Spaniards's preference for eating dinner late and staying out even later. Most restaurants didn't get a good dinner crowd going until 9pm, at the very earliest. As far as going out, as we learned from Doug's Madrileña friend Ana, staying out until 3am on a weeknight is not at all unusual.

8) Beginner to intermediate Spanish will work just fine. This is may not be true in less touristy cities and towns, but a combination of our iffy Spanish and an abundance of English-speakers meant that we only had a few communication issues.

Here's our itinerary for the trip. Doug and I agreed that it was pretty much perfect (good job, Doug!). The only change we would make is to not spend the night in Toledo and spend an extra night in Sevilla instead. 

Day 1: Fly to Barcelona
Day 2: Barcelona
Day 3: Barcelona
Day 4: Barcelona
Day 5: Barcelona to Madrid
Day 6: Madrid to Toledo
Day 7: Toledo to Madrid
Day 8: Madrid
Day 9: Day trip to Segovia
Day 10: Madrid to Cordoba to Sevilla
Day 11: Sevilla
Day 12: Sevilla to Granada
Day 13: Granada
Day 14: Granada
Day 15: Granada to Madrid
Day 16: Fly Home

Europe 2010: Barcelona

Posted by Katie

Our first stop, and probably our favorite city, was Barcelona.

We began our visit with a quick bite at Restaurante Neyras where we snacked on pa amb tomaquet, a staple of Catalan dining. Pa amb tomaquet is crusty bread topped with a mix of crushed tomatoes and olive oil and, as simple as it sounds, it is quite tasty.

Our exploration of the city started with a stroll down La Rambla, the main tourist street that runs perpendicular to the water. Right off La Rambla is the La Boqueria, an amazing public market.

Inside the market are stands selling everything from nuts and candies to fresh fruit and recently caught seafood.

Nick and I sampled the brightly-colored fresh fruit juices that are available throughout the market for as little as 1 euro. Nick tried the pineapple-lime and I went with pineapple-raspberry. Delicious and refreshing.

We also scored a bunch of fresh fruit at the end of the day for only 3 euro. Our selection included pineapple, kiwi, strawberries, watermelon, oranges and prickly pear (that's the magenta one.)

Most people associate Spain with tapas, but Nick and I found something that we like even better than tapas: pintxos. Pintxos are essentially slices of crusty bread topped with, well, anything. We discovered pintxos at Irati Taverna Basca, which sells pintxos for only 1.80 euro each (a great price, believe me.) Some of our favorite pintxos at Irati were the stuffed pepper, the fried mashed potato and jamon square, and the quiche.

At Irati, and at most pintxos and tapas places in Barcelona, you are given a plate and then can browse the restaurant's selection, choosing whatever looks good. At the end of your meal, you hand the plate to whoever is behind the counter and your leftover toothpicks are counted up to see how much you owe. Easy system once you figure out how it works.

If our dinner at Irati was our favorite meal in Barcelona, a close second was our lunch at Elisabets. Elisabets is a small restaurant located a few blocks off  La Rambla that serves Catalan comfort food. A three course lunch goes for only 10.25 euros, wine or beer included. The menu is only in Spanish, but luckily our waitress took pity on us and translated.

For our first course, Nick ordered penne bolognese and I got the Catalan green beans. Some fellow tourists at a table near us seemed to have some sort of problem with my green beans, and kept unsubtly trying to get a better look at them. In all fairness, they did look pretty gross...but they tasted amazing. Their loss.

For our main course, Nick had grilled steak with french fries and I had pork in tomato sauce. I took a leap of faith ordering pork as I don't usually like a plate with only meat, but the pork was tender and very tasty. Nick loved his steak too.

Our desserts where decidedly underwhelming, but that was fine with me because the first two courses where so great.

Plus I found a dessert in Barcelona that might be hard to top anyway: Magnum Gold?! ice-cream bars. Vanilla and caramel ice cream dipped in milk chocolate and covered in edible gold. Delicious and glamorous. My favorite. (Click the link above to watch the excellent commercial.)

So as you can see, we ate well in Barcelona. But I do have to admit, we did not find Irati and Elisabets on our own. Our two most delectable meals in Barcelona were all thanks to Rick Steves and his Snapshot Barcelona guidebook (and to my mom for sending it to me). Rick gave excellent suggestions as well as good directions for getting to each place and we wished we had his advice for all the other cities that we went to. I highly suggest his books for anyone traveling to Europe!

Coming up next: The disappointments of Monte Carlo...