Alhambra

 My main reason for wanting to travel to Granada-Alhambra. One of the great architectural marvels in the world and a prime example of Arabic architecture located in a stable location that is easy for a single woman to visit.

I had a guide, Maryla, who was meeting me at my hotel. She turned out to be a delight. She spoken English and Spanish (of course) but also Portuguese and Hebrew, and was learning Arabic. She was extremely well versed in the history of Alhambra. With her, I was able to skip all the lines and she knew exactly the right path to take to visit all the key locations on the site.

The property included a fort area where we could get amazing views of the city below.

There are also several palaces on the site, including Carlos V's western style building, not completed, and the Nasrid palaces which were stunning in their beauty and detail.

Many darker cooler rooms led to courtyards with pools. Every surface was decorated with Arabic text, repeating decorative patterns and inlaid tile or wood. Each room was more beautiful than the next.

From the main complex, we walked through a small street and garden to the Generalife, which was an adjoining summer palace. 

After a wonderful tour, Maryla walked me back down to the main Plaza where I could catch a cab to take me to the St Nicolas church area to a restaurant recommended by my travel agent and a great view of Alhambra.

Lunch was a delicious dish consisting of a 'roasted' (what we would call over easy) egg on a sauce of jamon, mushroom and truffle oil over a bed of very thinly sliced fried potatoes. The dish was delicious, although the pile of very thin fried potatoes was too much for me to eat the whole dish. After lunch, I found Los Italianos, which was recommended to me as the best gelato in town. A cone with two small scoops was only 2 euros.

After a rest back at my hotel room, I decided to walk to a tapas bar that was on my agent's list. I sat at the bar and ordered a couple of dishes, fried seafood and fried eggplant that looked like steak fries but served with something the Spanish call 'cane honey' but is essentially molasses. I came to a new appreciation for eggplant (berenjena) here. I also ordered a tinto verano (red wine with lemon soda, more popular apparently than sangria) and it came with fried cod. Now I had too much food! As I ate, two women sat next to me and from the sound of their conversation, I guessed they must be from Taiwan however I left them be. As I was almost done, one of the women turned to talk to me and we shared some basic info about each other. They were a pair of friends traveling together. One of them lived in Europe so they hadn't seen each other in awhile. They had a long vacation planned. When I was ready to leave, I left them the rest of the eggplant dish and the seafood. They seemed very pleased.

I ended the day with my usual shower and rest.