spain and portugal 2010

My recent 2 week vacation was fantastic. I spent 2 weeks in late may/early june traveling around Spain and Portugal. Part of the trip was solo (which was great!) and part of the trip was with a friend from residency.
Stop #1: Porto, Portugal - this town is known for being the home of port wine. The Port wine grapes grow in the NE portion of Portugal. After wandering around the town for a bit, I tagged along with two of the girls that were staying in the same room as me in the hostel and we went on a port wine cellar tour... which includes a couple of tastings.

The next day I hopped on a train and noticed the MILLIONS of 6-12 year old girls... I wondered to myself if perhaps there was some kind of school field trip to Lisbon and was later informed by the gentleman in the seat next to me that all of the people on the train were headed down to Lisbon for the Hannah Montana (Miley Cyrus) concert. The train patrons made so much more sense after that information ;)






Stop #2: Lisbon, Portugal - my favorite stop on my trip. Lisbon is a wonderfully old European city with a ton of beautiful buildings and interesting things to look at. Also, the city center did not have a lot of traffic and the public transportation system was amazing. There were a ton of narrow little pedestrian streets for wandering, which scores a city HUGE points in my book. I wandered aimlessly all day long. I really enjoyed the beautiful and colorful tiles that were on many of the buildings... it is so much more beautiful than paint!! It was amazing. Many of the streets were beautiful cobblestones with amazing designs. And of course, one of the other best things about Europe, the sheer number of choices of restaurants with outdoor seating and sitting around in the nice weather at a table enjoying food and drink. The other very special thing about this stop was getting to see an old friend from other traveling experiences. Lisbon gets an A+ and I would go back in a heartbeat. I took a bus tour around the city to see all of the sites. I also spent a large portion of the 2.5 days wandering the streets and the last day I hiked up to a look out point and an old castle above the city. Lisbon is built on 7 hills, so all the walking that I did helped me break even for all the sangria that I drank ;)








Stop #3: Madrid - I flew to Madrid and arrived the same day that I was meeting my friend. The first day in Madrid we spent wandering the streets and checking of all of the sights to see in the guidebook. There were some beautiful buildings, but Lisbon had it beat by a long shot :) The next day we got up and went to the Reina Sofia museum, which holds contemporary art. We admired a lot of Picasso and many other "interesting" contemporary/modern art pieces. We enjoyed some delicious tapas and my favorite sangria that night... which actually tasted mostly like bubbly grape juice :) We were beginning to understand at this point, the Spanish pork obsession....


We woke the next morning and decided to leave Madrid a day earlier than planned. We planned to catch the 11am train to Valencia, but Spain had a different plan for us!! Apparently it was a religious holiday and the trains were VERY sold out... so we ended up killing 5 hours in the train station waiting for the next train to Valencia.





Stop #4: Valencia - this was an improvisation in our original schedule as we decided to move on from Madrid. Valencia was a very cute and much smaller town. There were a lot of very cute restaurants and bars, with great decorations and it helped make each seem more unique. We had a great dinner with lots of Sangria and continued our daily tradition of ice cream supplementation ;) We went up in the tower of the cathedral which was a very narrow, steep spiral staircase and provided gorgeous views of Valencia from the top. I give the improvised stop a thumbs up!







Stop #5: Barcelona - A beautiful city. We arrived at the hostel, checked in and began exploring the city. Near our hostel we found a nice plaza with tons of outdoor restaurants. One in particular looked delicious for a reasonable price and we decided that the menu looked like the wait that we had in front of us. We stood in line for an hour, but definitely enjoyed the meal that we waited for. The next morning, we decided that a great way to see all of the sights would be to get a hop on/hop off bus tour, which would take us to all the major toursist attractions. Before we hopped on this bus for the day we walked around on La Rambla, a major tourist attraction with street performers and cafes, and we also walked around the market. The produce was a sight! The presentation amazing. The bus took us by the sight of the 1996 olympics, many beautiful churches and several different sights by Gaudi. We walked around the Pedrera, Casa Botlla and La Sagrada Familia and admired the very unique architectural style that Gaudi had, which would likely be viewed as interesting/strange/unique now, let alone in 1906 when he was building these sights. People must have really been wondering what he was thinking since these buildings seemed SO different than the gothic buildings that otherwise seemed to line the streets.

Two and a half days of wandering in Barcelona brought us to the end of our time there. We took the night train from Barcelona back to Madrid, and unfortunately, the beds were sold out.... so we sat up for the 9 hour ride. Needless to say, when we got back to Madrid (for my friend to make her flight the next morning) we were exhausted!! We got a quick nap in and headed back to the train station for a day trip to Toledo. Toledo is an old Medieval city that is very cute and old with nice narrow little streets... just the way I like them :) We spent a couple of hours wandering around Toledo, went in a couple of nice churches and up to the bell tower for a great view of the town. It was a beautiful day and the landscape was breathtaking.



We went back in to Madrid and had dinner and made sure my friend had all of the souvenirs she needed. We both left the next morning and I got on a bus for my final stop and the last 3 days of my trip.





Stop #6 - Granada The old town of Granada has so many different groups of people that still inhabit it's streets. It was the last of the Muslim cities to stand in Spain in 1275 and remained Muslim until the late 1400s when they finally surrendered to the Christians. There are so many interesting things about Granada. Some of the houses are actually caves built in to the hills. There are large populations of Spanish, Arabic and Jewish people, which is linked to the town historical. I enjoyed walking the streets of this small town, hiking up to the view points and interacting with the local people. The main attraction in town is the Ahlambra, which holds gardens, a palace and a military fortress. My last full day in Spain I visited this beauty and was amazed by the intricate and gorgeous carvings in the walls of the rooms of the palace.


I wandered around the palace and then went over to have a peek at the fortress. I climbed up in to the watch tower to take in the view of Granada below.








I ended up leaving Granada at midnight the morning of my flight home.... 5 hours on a bus... 1 hour on the Madrid metro to get to the airport... 4 hour wait in the airport.... 7 hour flight from Madrid to Washington DC.... 3 hour layover there and a 5 hour flight back to Portland made for one very tired girl! I hope you enjoyed my trip! If you would like to see more photos with captions please check out the following: http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/sredir?uname=snormie&target=ALBUM&id=5482136298724507841&authkey=Gv1sRgCID726mh6qX_lgE&invite=CJrax-QD&feat=email