And Madrid, and Marseilles...
As I mentioned in a previous post, Arbitrista and I are planning a trip to Spain and France! We now try to take one real vacation a year; this past spring we went to our beloved Finger Lakes wine region. We had been thinking about going to Sonoma Valley next year, and renting a house for a week and visiting wineries just like we do when we go to upstate New York. But once I started planning, we started rethinking it... it would cost nearly twice as much as going to NY, plus we would have to fly rather than drive so we couldn't bring back five cases of wine like we did this year... Also we love upstate NY - we've been five times in seven years, and people remember us, we're practically regulars! So we started thinking about going back to NY next year.
And then Arbitrista started wistfully saying "I'm never going to go to Spain, am I?" The boy has been obsessed with Spain for 20 years and he has never been there. I really want to go to France, as a result of my growing love of all things foodie, and I keep hearing that Spain is the new France, culinarily speaking.
And hell, we could get hit by a bus and die. Why wait?? We'll never think we can afford it. So let's just go, I said!
So we're going. In April. One week in Spain, one week in France. Arbitrista is choosing the destinations in Spain, and I am choosing where we go in France. So far our itinerary looks like this:
Arrive in Madrid
4 days in Madrid
2 days in Seville
1 day in Granada
Take the sleeper train from Madrid to Paris
4-5 days in Paris
1-2 days in Marseille
1 day in Aix-en-Provence
Fly home from Marseille
I'd love to go to Barcelona, but I'm willing to give it up in exchange for more time in France. Arbitrista is quite firm on his Spain choices, and I'm certainly not going to deny him what he's been dreaming of for two decades. I decided on Provence rather than one of the wine regions like Bordeaux partly because my 2009 calendar is all photos of Provence...
It's 8 months away but the planning is part of the fun. We've bought our Lonely Planet guides - it may have been a mistake to buy the country guides rather than the individual guides. I keep lamenting the fact that I'm not going to get to see the cheese caves in Roquefort. Oh well. Must focus! I've also been working out the details of our train travel, and I discovered The Man in Seat 61. This website is amazing; I highly recommend it to anyone planning to take a train in a foreign country.
You will be hearing more about this trip, I'm sure. It's all I think about!
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22 comments:
That looks like an awesome trip! I'm jealous. :-)
Not that you have to take my advice, but I'd skimp on the time in Madrid in favor of more time in Granada, or my favorite city Cordoba. Madrid is nice, but it felt like it could have been any large metropolitan city... I could have just as easily been in Manhattan or SF or London. Good museums, but maybe not 4 days worth of loveliness... Granada and Cordoba were both amazing and I wish we had planned more time in those cities. Amazing food and gorgeous architecture.
You can decent wines in the Rhone valley!
Awesome!!!!!
More assvice, but I second ScienceMama. I also thought Madrid was just like any other big city. Barcelona, on the other hand...well, I'm biased, because I lived there on and off for about 2 years total, and well, I love it even more than New York City. It's so beautiful, so user-friendly, so progressive, the food is amazing, the people are so interesting...I could go on and on, but you can get in touch with me if you really want me to do that :)
I'm sure you're loving all the ideas (:P), but if it were me, I'd take a day from Madrid and add it to Granada (you'll need at least half a day to see La Alhambra, and I'm sad we didn't stay there longer), and I'd take also a day from Sevilla... one day in Barcelona would not make justice to the city (I LOVED Barcelona... way more than Madrid, actually!), but maybe you could use it for Cordoba...
Check out frommers.com - they have a lot of really cool walking tours available (that's what we did when we lived in Berlin and were traveling like Europe was going to disappear!)
Do let me know if you have any questions - I have really good friends in Madrid and Barcelona, so they would be happy to come up with more tips and local stuff :)
Actually, I do appreciate all the advice! It's interesting to hear about everyone's experience with Madrid. Sounds like another day in Granada is definitely called for. I will pass all this on to the spouse!
I'll go with the rest of the crowd and recommend decreasing the Madrid time and ramp up the time in Granada. Or... if you CAN make it to Barcelona... well, I studied abroad in Spain while in high school and never made it there and really, truly regret it.
If you do wind up staying in Madrid for several days, I'd definitely recommend taking a day trip out to Segovia (half hour by bullet train) -- my favorite little city in Spain.
I second everybody, too, - why not fly directly into Malaga (close to Granada) right away? The south is the best (if you can't make it to Barcelona). Granada is worth a full day, and Cordoba and Sevilla are wonderful and very beautiful cities.
Bus to Paris? What a waste of time (either day time and sight seeing or waste of night time and wine sipping), check out the low-cost airlines, you should be able to get a 80 Euro flight from Sevilla to Paris (Check on bravofly.com or something like this).
TRAIN to Paris, not bus. :) It's the awesome Trainhotel, and will save us a night in a hotel.
Swoon! Oh this sounds so lovely, I'm jealous!
Will you take pictures of Angry Birds of France and Spain for us?
I did Spain last year and loved loved loved it. You've even included many of the cities I visited. Madrid was actually one of my favorite cities, but then I love NYC and Chicago as well. One suggestion might be to hit up a half day in Toledo, near Madrid. Small town, interesting history, and on the way I think to some of the other towns you're going to.
This trip sounds awesome!
I seriously loved the area around St Emilion/Libourne/Bordeaux last year, but it was very low key and we had a car and we were there for a wedding with locals. Still, I think there were things to see that we didn't bother with because of the wedding stuff.
That sounds like a great trip! With the AVE (high-speed train), you can get from Madrid to Barcelona in 2.5h or so... and it really is a great city. But it's always hard to squeeze all you want to see in a short week or two. At least I always end up with things unseen (and "need" to go back for that).
I'm definitely with those recommending more time in Granada if you have the option! Fantastic food (all those Moorish influences) and just a wonderful, atmospheric place.
I will be very surprised if you don't feel that you 'really need' to go back to Spain though, it's an impressive place... (and for MY taste the food is better than France - but my 'top ethnic food choice other than my native cuisine' would be Turkish/Lebanese/north African, so I'm maybe a little biased? As a foodie, do try and plan a future trip to Italy...
Abbey - we looked up Toledo last night, it sounds amazing!
JaneB - we did Italy in 2004. :) I would LOVE to go back, though - hell, I'd love to live there for the rest of my life!
We did the Paris-Madrid overnight train a couple of years ago - in the seats because the sleeping cars are v. expensive! It was really fun, although we didn't get much sleep. The overnight from Madrid-Lisbon was cheaper, and seeing as it was our honeymoon AND my husband's birthday, we payed the extra for a 1st class berth. It was awesome.
Anyway... I personally didn't care for Marseilles, although I do know people who love it. If you get there and decide you don't like it, Nice is only a couple of hours away by train and is nicer, IMO. Oh, and Monaco is just down the coast! Tons of fun for a day trip.
Sounds fantastique! Seriously. I spent a week in France this past December, and honestly fell in love. My husband and I are have also committed to an annual foreign vacation. We're tired of always saying 'next year'. We have enough money, and we just need to make the time.
Not sure how your French/Spanish is, but BBC online has a fantastic tutorial in many languages for all stages of language learning. I cannot recommend it highly enough.
Paris...the greatest city all over the world!! (just my opinion!;)
Cheers,
Vale from www.berlin49.de
The visits to upstate NY sound fun. Where did you go (if you are okay with saying on your blog)? No big deal if you'd rather not.
A fairly good friend of mine lives in Paris and works in a hotel there. It's somewhere between a hostel and an actual hotel - a lot of families stay there, and there is an option for bath in room or bath in the hall. She's an intense, but pretty cool person and the hotel has reasonable rates. I can give you her name and the hotel name if you guys are interested. :) She would certainly bend over backwards to help friends of mine.
Last summer we did 3 weeks in Western Europe. I highly support taking time away from Madrid and adding somewhere else. I did LOVE Barcelona and Madrid was only okay.
I suggest you check out Ricksteves.com and the graffiti board to help you plan things, also his travel books are wonderful for the planning stages. His accommodation recommendations are the best and most affordable I've found.
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