Nosherlot

We spent our honeymoon in Granada, loved the Alhambra but the best bit was sitting in various bars on the warm evenings looking at it floodlit from below. Wonderful

Econ

If you do go to Sevilla you should make sure you have time to see Italica at Santaponza, this is only about 8 klms round the M30 from the Malaga side of Sevilla towards Merida. Many people who go to Sevilla just think Sevilla, they have no idea that this place exists. Italica was the first Roman town in Spain, although most of it is buried under Santaponza but there is the amphitheatre, mosaics and more. You can walk up one of the remains of a Roman street towards some ruins of buildings from Italica, one of these streets still has functioning drains under it built be the romans.

You are not allowed to go down into the passages under the amphitheatre but you can walk around the amphitheatre and passages, none of the cenre floor timbers used in the middle of the amphitheatre remain so you can see down into the caverns where the animals and gladiators came up from in elevators, well worth a visit and a must for anyone going to Sevilla.

Hope this helps

rachelk

Have heard excellent things about Italica from someone who took a school trip there last year.

Meanwhile, back to Medina Azahara - from today's El Pais

http://www.elpais.com/articulo/andal...25elpand_2/Tes

Illegal building work will be "eliminated"

Lynn R

I've been round the Alhambra Palace twice and the thing that spoilt it for me was the sheer number of other visitors, ironic isn't it. I didn't think the Mezquita in Cordoba was as impressive as the Alhambra, but I prefer the rest of the city of Cordoba to Granada.

I particularly liked the Viana Palace in Cordoba (it's on the opposite side of the city from most of the other main attractions but well worth the trip, I think it took about 40 minutes to walk there from where we were staying very close to the Mezquita). There are 14 separate patio gardens in the grounds and it is absolutely stunning. Best of all we only saw one other visitor there throughout our visit.

I do like Sevilla too, and would encourage anyone visiting to go across the river and have a wander around the Triana district, I think it's lovely and there are some fantastic ceramic workshops where you can see handpainted tiles being made.

I never go anywhere on organised excursions, over the years we've found it more enjoyable and cheaper to go by public transport and inevitably it has cost less to go by bus or train and find a small hotel for the night, and have a 2 day trip for less than the price of an organised excursion for the two of us. For anyone visiting Cordoba I can recommend the Hotel Los Omeyos which is about 50m from the Mezquita, we paid 40€ for a room there which was very comfortable, clean and quiet, and would have slept 3 people as there were 3 single beds in it.