Seville

We left Granada for the 300 km drive on A92 to Sevilla after an early lunch. After another confusing driving experience, we settled down at Hotel Vime Corrigidor and set out to explore the city. We walked along Rio Guadalquivir to the Santa Cruz area with the Catedral and Alcazar. We stopped for tapas at a great bar close to Plaza del Triunfo called Bodega Santa Cruz. The food was awesome and cheap and people super friendly. After another walk under a beautiful evening sky, we had dinner outside on one of the side streets by the Catedral.

The next morning we visited Alcazar, a beautiful Muslim palace and gardens (€5 and €3 audioguide). It was nice to walk around the different wings of the gorgeous palace. We had more tapas for lunch, including a thick version of gazpacho called salmorejo, Lowell's favorite tortilla, and more berenjas con queso (eggplant with cheese). I love Spanish food. Since it was Sunday, the cathedral (€7.50) opened at 2:30pm, though it wasn't too crowded. We then walked up winding stairs to the top of Giralda, the cathedral minaret, which had great views of the city.

After a little shopping trip and siesta, we went to a flamenco show at El Arenal. We found this place through the hotel so it was a bit touristy, but easy and the show was interesting. We head out for a late dinner after the show and decided on El Giraldillo on Plaza del Triunfo. It has prime real estate right on the plaza with an amazing view of the cathedral. The restaurant is a bit expensive, but we decided to splurge for our last night in Andalucia and it was totally worth it to sit on the plaza on such a beautiful night.

Click here for more Sevilla pictures on Kodak Gallery.

Notes on Sevilla:
**For flights, cars, and hotels in Europe, we have been using Wegolo, a Dutch run travel site. Pretty good hotel deals and we found a lot of flights with the low cost European carriers like vueling (my favorite), clickair, and easyjet.
**The flamenco show was nice to see, but super touristy (€35 for show and one drink). Definitely don't do the dinner option, go out after.
**El Giraldillo charges a fee for sitting outside, as other restaurants do commonly. It was about €100 for an appetizer, dinner, and wine, and Lowell says the shoulder of lamb he had there was his favorite dish in Spain (check out more at food blog)