Granada (which means ‘grenade’ in English, but is also what they call pomegranates) was one of our favorite small towns we visited. It was a beautiful, high altitude city, set in the foot hills of the Sierra Nevadas of Spain. It is a gypsy town where people lived in caves, nicely furnished caves, but still caves. There are tons of artists everywhere, flamenco on every corner, and beautiful sights to take in.
The food is only alright, actually some of the worst we had in Europe, so you need to be careful where you eat. We did find delicious food, but only after suffering through a couple meals of “salads” that were made up of cabbage, canned corn, and a sprinkling of tuna… Yeah, that bad.
There were tons of cool shops, delicious teas, and a beautiful palace called The Alhambra. The Alhambra will stay in our heads for a while for both good and bad reasons. They only allow a certain amount of visitors in a day, so if you know you’re going there you should buy your tickets early. And I mean early, like months in advance. We tried a few weeks prior and it was sold out. Good thing they still sell a few tickets for the day of. We got up early to make it to the line by 7:00 the first morning thinking that would be enough time. The ticket office opens at 8:00 so it seemed reasonable. We were wrong. We sat in the cold for three hours to not even get tickets to the palace that day. Sooooo, the next day we did it all over, this time arriving by 6:15. We got them, and the palace was more than amazing and totally worth the wait. But if you go, definitely just get up really early one day, two early days is just too much.
Overall, Granada was charming and exciting. The little city has so much to offer. Just getting lost wandering through the Albacin can lead to a wonderful afternoon. We loved this place.