Travel Review: Vacation in Spain & France, Bayonne, Seville, Madrid, Cordoba, Granada, Bilbao, Alhambra, Mezquita, Guggenheim

Review by traveler

Laurel G.

7.6.2018

General Info

Traveler Review

Which Country (Countries) did you visit on this trip?

Spain

France

Your overall comments on the trip and the travel company:

It was an absolute pleasure working with this travel agent. I chose her agency because she was so responsive to all my questions and really worked hard to plan the trip according to my needs and concerns. Even before I selected her, she gave me a detailed itinerary and willingly changed it various times in response to my requests. As she promised, she was there with us by phone, email and text for the entire four weeks of our journey to Spain. If there was a problem with a room at a hotel, I contacted her and she had it changed to a better one for no additional cost. When I was sick, she made sure a doctor came to the hotel. She was like our guardian angel the whole time. All the guides were wonderful. With them, we saw things we might not have seen on our own. When I requested a road map for Spain for the times we would be driving, she provided me with an amazing huge book like map that covered the entire country and put colored arrows to indicate places we should stop and see. The wifi device she gave us was AMAZING. I was able to use google maps and did not have to get an expensive American global plan for my phone. It allowed us to be connected to the internet for hours at a time. As we are an older couple, it was wonderful to have this trip created expressively for us and our interests. It also felt very safe knowing that someone was always there in case of a problem.

What were the most enjoyable or memorable parts of your trip?

We saw so much that it is difficult to answer this question. We loved the flamenco show she arranged for us see in Madrid, driving through amazing vistas in both the south and the north and visiting small fishing villages on the north coast as well as the amazing hill towns in the south, seeing great works of art at major museums in Madrid (Las Meninas, The Third of May, Guernica, The Garden of Earthly Delights, etc.), the many castles built by the Moors, watching the sun set over the Alhambra, walking through the winding streets of the many old medieval towns we visited, the Mezquita in Cordoba, visiting Seville, Toledo, Segovia, Ronda (spectacular site), Santiago de Compostela, Bilbao with the fabulous Gehry designed Guggenheim, the many gorgeous cathedrals everywhere, the old Jewish quarters in various cities, the day trip we took into France with a private driver and guide to see Bayonne, Biarritz and St. Jean de Luz, and so much more. We arrived home three days ago so I am still trying to process it all.

If you could take your trip again, what would you do differently?

I would have eliminated Santillana del Mar which could have been seen in an hour or two rather than in the overnight we had. The parador we were booked in lacked air conditioning and smelled. Our travel agent then got us into a better parador nearby, but even so, it was a bit dark and depressing. I would have rather spent more time in Cangas de Onis in the Picos de Europa as the parador there was wonderful. I should also have been warned of the difficulty of getting and returning rental cars in some of the underground garages with all the luggage we had. It was particularly difficult in Granada where after renting a car, we had to walk with all our luggage through the city to an underground parking lot. Even though we had 4 wheeled luggage, the tiled and stone streets made it very difficult to pull them. Luckily, in San Sebastian, we dropped our luggage off at the hotel first before driving to the Europcar office quite a distance away in a mall to return the car. I wish the agency had made it a bit easier regarding the pick-up and return of the rental cars.

Photos

Travel Review: Vacation in Spain & France, Bayonne, Seville, Madrid, Cordoba, Granada, Bilbao, Alhambra, Mezquita, Guggenheim

General Info

Which Country (Countries) did you visit on this trip?

Your overall comments on the trip and the travel company:

What were the most enjoyable or memorable parts of your trip?

If you could take your trip again, what would you do differently?

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