nightmarch

Prologue
My wife and I began talking about our travel plans for this summer in the fall of 2012. We figured that if we were to have kids in a year or two, this might be our last chance to do extended travel for a while. So we looked at different possible options for a trip: Tahiti, Australia, Nicaragua, and portions of Europe. I kept a watch on our frequent flier balances and award availability, and saw that if we kept traveling, we could hit most of these places without going (too) broke. In a lot of cases, award availability was better if we were to keep traveling our way across the world. I spent a lot of time on Flyertalk this past year, and some of it paid off. We greatly appreciate the Flyertalk community's knowledge as we planned this trip, and we would not have been able to do this trip without miles and points.

In the end, due to time constraints, we couldn't fit in Nicaragua. But we did get to see Tahiti and Moorea, Sydney, Paris, Malaga and Granada, and several cities in Ireland. We also had day trips to Lourdes and Melilla.

Our flight plan was:
HNL-PPT-MOZ-PPT-AKL-SYD-HKG-CDG, ORY-LDE, PUF-ORY, ORY-AGP-MLN-AGP-ORK, DUB-ORD-DEN-HNL. AKL, HKG, ORD, and DEN were solely to connect.



Note on Air Travel
Our air travels were in Y. I'll talk about some of our flight experiences, but economy air travel on this trip fell within the narrow and uninteresting band between decent and somewhat uncomfortable. Please don't expect reviews of lie flat beds or a running total of Dom consumed during our flights.

nightmarch

We live in Hawaii. Once a week, there is a direct flight from Honolulu to Tahiti that is operated by Hawaiian Airlines. We booked that flight using Hawaiian Miles and arrived in PPT at about eleven at night. After a long (and getting longer) immigration line, we reached the Intercontinental Tahiti at close to midnight. The cost for the cab was about 1800 XPF, as expected. We were traveling to Moorea the next day.

The Intercontinental Tahiti was fine. I booked a standard room using the Chase reward night. That is more or less what I got. There was some fruit in our room for us on arrival, and our room had a view of the ocean at an angle.


View of the ocean and Moorea from our room at the Intercontinental Tahiti.

In the morning, we headed back to the airport and took a short 10 minute flight to Moorea. We rented a car from Albert's. It was early, so we drove around the island (about 90 minutes to 2 hours) and had lunch. We were able to check in to our bungalow at the Hilton Moorea at about one o'clock.

The Hilton Moorea was gorgeous. I booked two nights there using Hilton Hhonors points under the old reward chart. Yes, I know I should have booked an AXON reward. I had considered that, but we also wanted to spend some time on Tahiti during this trip. We had considered paying for an upgrade to an overwater bungalow, but we decided to stick with the deluxe garden bungalow.


Plunge pool at our bungalow.


Bungalow interior.


Bungalow bathroom.

We enjoyed the use of the private plunge pool. We also made use of the complimentary kayak equipment. The water in Moorea by the Hilton was clear, warm, and calm during our stay. We were Hhonors gold during our stay, so we had the continental breakfast in the morning. In the evenings, we ate at the crepes bar at the Hilton. Lunch was generally a sandwich from the nearby snack bar or a market. We drove around the island each day, and we went to the Belvedere Lookout for a great view of the bays.


Continental breakfast.


Moorea, with Tahiti in the background.


Moorea, from the Belvedere lookout.

Two wonderful nights passed quickly. We made our way back to Tahiti. The Moorea airport was small, had no real security (no metal detector), and had chickens and cats roaming the airport interior.


Chicken in the Moorea airport.

After a ten minute flight, we landed in Tahiti. I picked up a rental car and drove to the Le Meridian Tahiti. The combination of rush hour, being in an unfamiliar place and unfamiliar car, and never having had navigated through roundabouts before made for a very nerve wracking drive.

The Le Meridian Tahiti was nice, but it isn't the Hilton Moorea. I booked a standard room with cash & points for two nights under the old C&P chart. We got a nice upgrade to a panoramic oceanview room.


View from our room at the Le Meridian Tahiti.

We spent some time in the pool and spent the next day driving around Tahiti. We had lunch at the beach, did a short hike to some waterfalls, saw a Marae (temple), and hit a few other sights. For dinner, the Le Meridian Tahiti is near a shopping center, so we picked up food at the nearby supermarket.


Waterfall.


Beach where we had a picnic lunch. I think this was in Papara.


Arahurahu Marae.

On our last day in Tahiti, I came down with stomach problems. Our flight out wasn't until one in the morning. I had originally received a late checkout at 4 PM. I had thought that we could kill time at a shopping center or along the waterfront, but given my situation, I asked how much it would cost to do a very late check-out. Say around 9 PM. They said it would be $50. Sold.

Having explored Tahiti the previous day, we spent this day near the hotel (and bathroom). In the late afternoon I was feeling better and was able to head to the pool for a bit.

Fredrik74

Hilton Moorea really looked nice. I think I've read that Tahiti in general is very expensive. Did you feel that way too?

nightmarch

It depends. The hotels are expensive, but we used points for that.

For food, the crepes at the Hilton for dinner were about $20-$25, but one filled me up. An ala carte room service order at the Le Meridian for scrambled eggs and four small pancakes was $20, but it came with a basket of pastries and was enough for two of us.

Food in grocery stores and snack bars weren't too bad. At the grocery store, baguettes were about $0.60-$1. A small carton of some lemon-ice sorbet thing was about $2.50. Prepared sandwiches and food to go from the supermarket ranged from $2-$8.

Rental cars, especially if you need an automatic (which I did), were very expensive. I think they averaged about $60-80/day after mileage. So either you pay to eat and do stuff at the hotel and take taxis or arrange other transportation, or you pay for the rental car to be able to get cheaper food/activities.

Some activities may also be covered by the hotel. For example, the Hilton Moorea had complimentary kayaks and snorkeling equipment (although we brought our own snorkeling stuff).

General souvenirs were expensive. The cheapest t-shirt I saw was around $20-$25.

I would sum up by saying that you can obviously spend a fortune there if you wanted to, but there are ways around that, especially if you can reduce some of the cost of the hotel via points.

nightmarch

We waited in line at PPT for an hour and a half to check in to our Air New Zealand flight to Auckland, where we would connect to our flight to Sydney. The PPT check in area is open-air (no air conditioning), so it was pretty miserable. We used United miles for this portion of our trip.

There were a large number of high school students from New Zealand wearing rugby uniforms on our plane, but they thankfully were quiet for most of the flight.

We liked Auckland's airport. It was clean and the airport staff seemed friendly, although it was cold.

Once we landed in Sydney we had a minor issue with customs. One of the questions asked is if we were bringing in soil, including, I believe, if we had soil on our shoes from recent hiking. We went on a short hike to a waterfall in Tahiti. Being paranoid, I answered yes. The customs people checked my shoes and had them cleaned before I was able to enter. At least they cleaned them and didn't confiscate them.

We chose to stay at the Holiday Inn Old Sydney. For a brief period of time, reward rooms were available during our dates for 10k priority club points. We were able to redeem our points at that rate, which was fantastic. Our room was not available on our arrival at noon, so we had lunch at a nearby cafe and went souvenir shopping. This probably was a bad idea in general because we were tired and had no idea of what fair prices were, but in the end the prices weren't too bad.

We finally were able to check in to our room and went straight to bed...except our room was directly across from a bar, this was a holiday weekend for Australia, and it was also the last few days of the Vivid light festival in Sydney. It was loud. And I had contacted the hotel prior to arrival requesting a quiet room. Anyway, after a couple of hours, and thanks to some help from the front desk, we were able to switch to a somewhat quieter room. Finally sleep. The room itself was fine, although it was beginning to show its age, especially in the bathroom.


View from our room at the Holiday Inn Old Sydney.

We visited the cathedral, the Royal Botanical Gardens, and the library. We also saw a performance at the Sydney Opera House. The Opera House had changing lights and images at night during the Vivid festival.


Tree at the botanical gardens.


Harbor Bridge.


Opera House during the Vivid festival.


Different lighting of the Opera House during the Vivid festival.

We also visited the Taronga Zoo across the harbor. Perhaps it was just the day, but my wife, who is susceptible to seasickness, felt fine on the ferry ride to and from the zoo's dock. We enjoyed the zoo, but since it was still a holiday weekend, it seemed like the entire city of Sydney was at the zoo, making the experience crowded and less pleasant than it could have been.


The penguin exhibit at the zoo was closed, but we did see kangaroos.


The ferry also provides great views of the Opera House.


Sydney skyline from the zoo.

One of the things that we like to do when visiting a place for a few days is to get out of the city for a bit. Sydney had several good options, and we decided on the Blue Mountains, about two hours by rail away. We did the short walk to Circular Quay, took the train to Central Station, and switched trains to go on to Katoomba after briefly walking around Chinatown. Once in Katoomba, we walked about forty-five minutes to Echo Point to see the Three Sisters. It was beautiful, and one of the best natural sights on our trip. It was also fairly cold, but at least viewing conditions were great.


Three Sisters and the Blue Mountains.

Overall we enjoyed Sydney, although it was really crowded due to the Vivid festival and the holiday weekend. For the first few nights it was difficult to walk around at night, with all of the people around...and on our last night, after the holiday and the festival were over, the streets were nearly deserted. I think the best part for both of us was seeing the Blue Mountains, which I'd highly recommend.

Sydney itself was a bit expensive, and we ate a lot of our meals in cafes, at food stalls from markets, or take away. Fortunately, with our hotel's location, there were a number of reasonable options nearby.

cxny1090

Great report so far! I stayed at the Le Meridian Tahiti last month as well. My stay was good, but not great. I stayed in one of the overwater bungalows (which was an experience) but would not stay in it again. It was kind of overrated.

What did you think of the service? How did you like Tahiti? IMO, I thought it was a nice place to visit but there is no rush to go back. I prefer Hawaii.

I look forward to read the next part of your journey!

nightmarch

Thanks. My stay at the Le Meridian Tahiti was pretty good. The upgrade was very nice, room service was fast, and they were very accommodating of my late checkout requests. Having the marketplace nearby up the road was also helpful, even though we had a car. I did find the design and room furnishings of the Le Meridian slightly disconcerting, especially some of the exterior red walls.

Overall I liked Tahiti but loved Moorea. The difference was like Oahu versus the neighbor islands. Tahiti felt a bit like Oahu, except the signs are in French, there were more birds, black sand beaches instead of white, way more imus being used, a little more graffiti along the main road, and a lot less traffic. That said, I think I prefer Hawaii over Tahiti, too.

nightmarch

Getting to Paris

I was consciously trying to relax and spend less time glued to my tablet while on the trip, and aside from a couple of emails and Facebook updates managed to do pretty well. While we were in Sydney, I happened to check some of my RSS feeds, and saw that there was an air traffic controller strike scheduled for France. And as it happened, our next destination was Paris, via Hong Kong.

Ok, that is not good. So I check when the strike is planned for, and it would indeed coincide with our flight to Paris. After swearing for about ten minutes, I finally decide there is not a whole lot I can do about it, other than to start thinking of other places in Australia (or Hong Kong) to visit in case we were stranded.

We were flying to Paris via Hong Kong on Cathay Pacific, using AA miles. Apparently, economy redemptions cannot get a seat assignment until 48 hours before the flight. So at about 3 AM in the morning, Sydney time, I get up to check on our flight situation for the Hong Kong to Paris flight. There is a little more information available at this point: Cathay Pacific originally had two flights scheduled to Paris from Hong Kong on this day. They were requested to cut capacity by 50% due to the strike. They cancelled the other flight.

Sometimes, you just need to get lucky on a 50-50 coin flip. I was able to get our seat assignment, and a couple of days later we went to the airport to check in. I kept tabs and verified that our Paris flight was still scheduled, which the people at the Sydney airport confirmed.

One interesting thing was that the public bathroom in the Sydney airport (landside) included a shower. It was kind of a nice touch. I didn't use it but at a glance it seemed at least reasonably clean.

My wife dropped her passport in one of the stores at the Sydney airport, but fortunately somebody pointed that out before we left the store.

I should also point out that my major error in redeeming miles for our entire trip was doing an economy redemption for the Sydney to Paris leg. Sydney to Paris via Hong Kong involved about 22 hours of flight time. The difference between biz and econ was, I think, 60k AA miles vs. 40k AA miles. If there was any leg that called for an upgrade to business class, it was this one. Effectively 20k AA miles for 22 hours in biz. On Cathay Pacific. I am an idiot. An idiot with a very sore butt after 22 hours of sitting in econ.

Anyway, we were quickly off to Hong Kong. Having a printed menu in economy was nice. Both my wife and I had the fish for dinner, which (for economy food) was fine. The IFE was good.

Once in Hong Kong, I went off in search for some water and food. Indeed, we did have a flight to Paris. It looked like Cathay Pacific changed the plane to a 747 at some point, probably for the extra space so they could accommodate some of the passengers on the cancelled flight.

We left Hong Kong a bit after midnight, and coming from Sydney I just wanted to sleep. For some reason, though, Cathay Pacific decided to leave the lights on, and started their first meal service. Which was fine, but sleep probably would have been better. :P

Otherwise, the flight into Paris was long but uneventful. We got into CDG a little before 8 AM.

nightmarch

Paris
So despite the air traffic controller strike we made it in to Paris. One concern that I had was how to make it into Paris without going broke, because we were coming in at rush hour. I wound up using the Le Cab service for this leg, which offered a flat rate to/from CDG (and similarly for ORY). It worked as planned and there was a driver waiting for us at the airport.

We then inched our way to Paris, taking an hour and a half to finally get to the Holiday Inn Saint Germain des Pres. I felt kind of bad for the cab driver, but presumably the rates and/or his pay factor expected traffic into the equation. I figured that we would be exhausted after our day of travel, so I had booked a room for the night before to guarantee a room for early arrival. These rooms were booked using PC points under the old reward chart.

The room itself was fine but the layout was odd, like an L shape. I think a service closet took out part of what should have been the room. It had a slight view of the Eiffel Tower. The door to the bathroom was a sliding door that was not fully opaque, and the light switch for the bathroom was by the bed and front entrance--so using the bathroom at night meant that some light is going to flood the main room. Or I guess I could have used a flashlight.


This is what I mean--it isn't fully transparent, but this door definitely lets the light through, and you can see the outline of the person in the bathroom.


Eiffel Tower from our room, totally using the zoom feature on the camera.

Despite the name, the Holiday Inn Saint Germain des Pres is not in Saint Germain des Pres. The area seemed decent, though, and it was literally a minute from a metro entrance, so it worked out fine for us.

Louvre

After getting settled, we actually had some energy, so we decided to take the metro to the Louvre. I had booked advanced tickets, which were sent by mail, so we could skip the main line. They also didn't have a specific day they needed to be used--we could have used them on a different day (I think they were good for about a year). The bad thing was that it was cold and rainy, and despite having brought an umbrella with us throughout Tahiti and Australia, even during sunny days, we forgot to bring it with us when we went out to the Louvre.

After wandering the museum and checking out the Mona Lisa with a thousand of my closest friends, we started to get tired, so we headed back to the hotel to crash.


Napoleon III apartments, Louvre.


Blurry picture of the Mona Lisa. This was as close as I got.


Louvre.

I woke up the next morning at about 5 AM, which isn't bad considering all of the time zones we passed through. I went to look for food at about 6:45 AM--everything was still closed. I did run into a guy openly urinating in the street. Lovely.

I went out again at about 7:30 and finally places near the hotel started to open.


Throughout our stay, I had several sandwiches from the store on the left and croissants and pain chocolate from the store on the right.

Versailles
The two major things my wife wanted to do on this trip were Versailles and Lourdes. We made our way to Versailles via the metro and RER train. It was standing room only on the way to Versailles. Coming back in the late afternoon we easily got a seat (but Versailles was the starting point).

On the way to Versailles, some people with accordions got on the train and started playing very loudly and (to me) very poorly. Thankfully they left after about fifteen minutes.

Once we made it to Versailles, we encountered a very long line. I had advance tickets. I talked with a security guy, who informed me that everyone in this line also had tickets and was waiting to get in. Which kind of defeats part of the purpose of having advance tickets. So we waited for an hour until we were able to get in.

We spent over an hour in the Versailles Chateau. The Hall of Mirrors was very impressive. We also made our way through the Trianon Palaces and a small portion of the gardens, making a full day out of this visit.


Waiting in line at Versailles.


Gardens at Versailles.


Hall of Mirrors, Versailles


Hall of the Battles, Versailles


Versailles


Trianon Palace, Versailles

One thing we also noticed is that the French do not screw around with security at their national monuments. At Versailles and, later, at the Eiffel Tower, we noticed French military personnel in groups of 3, all (seemingly) heavily armed, patrolling. We also intermittently heard what sounded like a single gunshot while we were at Versailles. I joked to my wife that maybe that's what France does to silly American tourists.

Finally, with aching feet, we headed back to Paris from Versailles using the RER. We had encountered a number of French schoolkids at Versailles. Some of them, accompanied by their teacher and chaperones, got into our RER train car right before we left Versailles. A few of them sat directly across from us. My wife said that they were playing a game to see how long it would take for us to look at them, since I was staring out the window for a while. They left after five or six stops.

roastpuff

Terrific posting! I would love to do something similar. The trip report is not finished yet, you're not home yet!

nightmarch

Lourdes
We had a few other days in France. The other major site that we wanted to see was Lourdes. Lourdes is a French town in the midi-Pyrenees. Its major claim to fame is a Catholic shrine where a girl, Bernadette, repeatedly reported seeing Mary in a grotto in the 1850s. You can fly into a nearby airport, take a longish train from Paris (or other places), or drive. It was about an hour flight from Paris, so we chose to fly, paying cash for the Air France flights. I also used the Le Cab service again to go to and from Orly.

We flew out of Orly, which was much more convenient than CDG. I had arranged with a Lourdes taxi company to take us from Lourdes-Tarbes airport to the center, and then to take us to Pau airport in the evening, where we had our flight back to Paris.

Lourdes was very crowded. A lot of people, some of them gravely ill, come to Lourdes for the waters, which supposedly have healing properties. We stopped at the grotto, then head back to the Lourdes town for lunch. After finding a place to eat, the waiter asks for our orders, I gesture to my wife, who orders a salad and a sandwich, and then the waiter...disappears. I apparently don't get to order food. It turned out okay, as the salad was bigger than expected and contained a lot of things that Mrs. Nightmarch doesn't like to eat. We later found some crepes for her.

After lunch we headed back to the grotto. There were several churches, and when we visited one it looked like a mass would be starting soon, so we sat down. So it began, but it was (as expected) in French. Throughout the mass these girls would distribute water in little plastic cups. I initially took one and drank it. The girls later came around again, distributing more water. I indicated that I was fine and didn't need more. Then the girl asks for the plastic cup back. I give it to her, and she puts it at the bottom of the stack of cups from which she's pouring out the water. So they are reusing the cups, and there are a bunch of sick people here. Great. So far, though, I am still alive, so that little French girl (and my stupidity) has not killed me. Yet.

We visited one of the other churches, then went back into Lourdes. Lourdes was full--and I mean full--of souvenir stores, so we took a quick look before we had to go off to the airport again. Pau airport was about 45 minutes away by car. We had a bite to eat at the airport and returned to Paris uneventfully.


Lourdes. I think these are the Basilica of the Rosary and the Basilica of the Immaculate Conception.


Lourdes grotto.

Notre Dame
Back in Paris, the following day we took the metro to see Notre Dame.

By the Notre Dame entrance, there was a mime who would put on a scary mask and follow unsuspecting people around, typically attractive girls. It was a little weird. That might get you shot in parts of the US, but I guess this was France.

We thought about going up to the tower, but the line seemed long so we skipped that. We also were starting to feel the effects of travel, so after some souvenir shopping we went back to the hotel and rested.


Notre Dame


Notre Dame

An exciting last few hours in Paris
On our day of departure, we had several hours before our flight to Spain. So on checking out I asked the hotel to store our bags, and we went out in a thunderstorm to do more sightseeing.

We took the RER train to the Eiffel Tower. The exit out was flooded, so we had to wait for them to clear that up, and on exiting the RER my wife felt someone come up very close to her. We think somebody tried to pickpocket something from her purse, but we didn't find anything missing.

We also went to the Luxembourg Gardens, which was fairly close to the hotel. The weather had cleared by this point, so sitting in the park was nice, especially with all the walking we had been doing over the past several days.


Luxembourg Gardens

After an hour in the gardens we returned to the hotel, picked up our bags, and I found the car service person to take us to the airport.

A very eventful airport day

We arrived at the airport about two and a half hours before check in. We were flying the LCC Vueling to Malaga Airport in Spain. So we walk towards the desks, but are told by a staff person that they don't start checking people in until two hours before the flight. There isn't a lot of seating available, so we sit down on the ground for half an hour.

They announce that the Malaga flight now is ready to check in, so a mass of people start to go through. We join that mass, and find ourselves in a lane with what appears to be two lines...but is actually a jumbled line that merges together later--effectively twice the length you'd expect since there's twice the people. The other lane is just one (regular-sized) line. I am running bad at choosing lines and lanes.

But we arrive at the counter about an hour and a half before our flight. So we should be good. I measured and weighed our luggage beforehand and we should be fine.

Suddenly, the clerk starts talking about how I need to take our luggage away. I am confused and, unfortunately, think that she is messing with me. What I didn't put together were a bunch of French policemen asking people if some random suitcase in the middle of the terminal was theirs. Nobody claimed it. So now we have a terminal dump right when we're at the check in desk. Except the instructions to vacate are being shouted in French--French is not the language of love when an angry dude with a gun is shouting at you and a thousand other people to move--and my French has deteriorated to je voudrais (point to object), single digit numbers, and a few other phrases, which unfortunately (or fortunately) don't involve anything to do with terminals, luggage, or bombs.

So we spend an anxious and confused twenty minutes waiting, but they open up again, and we find ourselves waiting again to check-in. Time is ticking, and we start to get anxious when we're behind very slow people at the security line, but we make it through and even have enough time to stop to pick up a couple sandwiches for the flight. It was just kind of frustrating that we almost missed our flight -- or were anxious that we would miss our flight -- because of airline procedure. If we had been able to check in, or even able to stand in line to check in, when we got to the airport, we would have had been good to go, even with the terminal dump.

TWA4Me

Fascinating itinerary and great trip report. It's nice to see that some of us travel, if reluctantly, in the "main cabin." I am looking forward to further installments. You write well and really capture the essence of the experience. Unfortunate about some of the less stellar aspects (coach from SYD to CDG, the language issues in CDG, etc...), but reality is such that these things are bound to happen. Those items are very helpful for future reference.

nightmarch

Thanks all for the encouragement and feedback. I appreciate it.

I started my normal job again, so it will take a while for me to finish the whole report.

Spain
We landed in Malaga at about nine o'clock. After the experience was had at the Paris airport, I wanted to just to get to our hotel, the ultra-luxe Holiday Inn Express, Malaga, as quickly as possible.

We found a taxi. Who then demanded a flat rate of 19 Euro, despite the hotel being very close to the airport. Actually 20 Euro, since I gave him a 20 and didn't receive any change back. Whatever, I was honestly getting too tired to care, although I hate feeling like a sucker. This was more than what we paid to go from the Malaga city center to the airport a few days later, and it took almost as much time, too.

So the HIX Malaga, despite being near the airport, really doesn't save you that much time or cab fare. In retrospect, I would have chosen a hotel in the city center. I paid cash for the room. The one odd thing I noticed about the room was that...you know those door hanger things--the do not disturb sign, room service breakfast orders--that most hotels have? This one had one for room repairs. It made me wonder just how many room issues they had. That said, our room was fine.


View from our room at the HIX.

The following morning we ate the continental breakfast provided by the HIX, then checked out, storing our bags for the day at the hotel's luggage room. room. Due to the HIX's location, cabs do not just wait there for a fare. We had the front desk call one to take us to the airport.

Melilla
We were on a flight to Melilla on Iberia (operated by Air Nostrum). Cash flight. Why Melilla? One of Mrs. Nightmarch's goals was to visit all the continents (or at least the continents minus Antarctica) during her life. She was missing South America and Africa. We figured Africa would be the more difficult of the two to get, and being in Europe during this trip presented us with an opportunity.

Spain has two small pieces of territory in Africa, which are surrounded by Morocco (and the water), Ceuta and Melilla. We chose Melilla because it was directly accessible by plane from Malaga. The alternative would be a ferry, which would take several hours.

The flight was uneventful and surprisingly full. I couldn't figure out why everyone else was on this flight.

We land in Melilla, and we head out and look for a taxi. We are one of the first people out, and while there are no taxis immediately available, there is a helpful sign that says taxi, so we wait there. Unfortunately, everybody else from our flight waits at this crosswalk sign that is a good distance before the taxi sign. So the taxis stop there to pick people up. After about half an hour, after everybody waiting at the crosswalk sign get picked up, we finally get a taxi.


You can see the taxi sign in the far distance.

Melilla was not in any of the guidebooks that I found, and my knowledge of where to go was limited to a couple of Wikitravel and Tripadvisor posts. We head to Plaza Espana in the city center, about ten minutes away, and from there we find our way to the old fort of Melilla. It was actually very nice and pleasant to explore. There were a number of residential buildings, churches, and museums along the way. We stopped at one of them by accident, a military museum.


Melilla


Melilla


Melilla

After spending a couple of hours exploring the fort, we then went in search for something to eat. We exit the old fort, find what looks like a main street, and find something to eat. One of the things I liked about Spain was the menu del dia--a set menu, generally with three courses, with prices in the ballpark of 10 Euro. After twenty minutes of searching we finally found a sit down restaurant that looked okay. We were getting tired of sandwiches by this point, which is mostly what we ate for lunch in France, Sydney, and Tahiti.

Language was a slight problem in the restaurant--Melilla is not exactly geared for tourists, especially non-Spanish tourists--but we were at least able to order and got roughly what we wanted.


Fish and chips.

The restaurant was also near a taxi stand--and this one actually had waiting taxis. We got back to the airport and wait a few minutes for our flight to start letting people through to security. Due to the kind of sensitive nature of the place, we also had to go through a passport check before proceeding to the gate. That went smoothly and we were quickly on our way back to (European) Spain.

DL17

Very fun and great TR. Thank you

nightmarch

Granada

We landed in Malaga airport and I had arranged for a driver to take us from Malaga to Granada. The driver was waiting for us and we stopped at the HIX Malaga Airport to pick up our bags. He said that the hotel we were staying at, the NH Victoria in Granada, would be much nicer than the HIX Malaga Airport (it was), and basically, but nicely, laughed at us for staying at the HIX.

Anyway, he mentioned a few places to eat in Granada -- we unfortunately weren't able to eat at any of them -- and talked about the Alhambra and his life in Spain. It was about an hour and a half from Malaga Airport to Granada by car.

The NH Victoria was nice. We had an interior room with no real view. What I liked about the room was that there was a door separating the bedroom from the hall/bathroom/closet/entryway, so it was like having a suite except there was no real living space outside the bedroom. But you could stick a chair or something out there if you wanted to. It also reduced hallway noise. The hotel had free wifi, but only up to a relatively low cap (100 MB) that I quickly ran into.


NH Victoria


Our awesome view at the NH Victoria. You can see into the dining room below. I guess the good thing was we didn't have any street noise.

It was starting to get into the evening, so we just wandered the shops of Granada for our first night there. We had crepes and room service sandwiches for dinner.

The main thing that I wanted to see on this trip was the Alhambra in Granada. We had ordered advance tickets, with an entry time of 10 AM to Palacio Nazaries, but we still needed to pick them up at the Alhambra. We had a late start the following morning, and didn't get out the door until about 8:30-8:45 AM. We also hadn't had a good breakfast. I went out in the morning and -- bless me father for I have sinned -- went to the Burger King across the street from our hotel, and its doors were opened, but the only person inside told me they were closed. OK. Most shops were closed, but after wandering for half an hour I did find a small cafe that had croissants, so I brought those back for us to eat. Between that and some croissants and pain chocolat I had from Paris, we were okay for a bit, and we ate those on the way to the Alhambra.

Despite the time constraints, we also decided to walk to the Alhambra. Don't do this. Our driver from Malaga warned us against it, and the hill was extremely steep, and there are plenty of taxis in Granada that were available -- and they even have a bus that goes to the Alhambra. Nevertheless, despite the time and due to our high tolerance for pain, we were able to pick up our tickets and were in line to see the palace at about 9:45.

The Alhambra was everything I thought it would be--beautiful, sensual, magical. We stayed on the grounds all day, exploring Palacio Nazaries, the Generalife Gardens and Palace, and the Alcazar throughout the day. Between those explorations, we got hungry and first went to the cafe at the Parador...but we didn't seem to get served. Or waited on. This might have been a cultural norm issue--the standard might have been to order directly at the bar. I don't know. We wound up eating sandwiches fresh from a vending machine. They were...adequate. Which is more than I expected.


Palacio Nazaries


Palacio Nazaries


Generalife Gardens


Generalife Palace


Alcazar


Mountains from the Alhambra


Granada and vicinity from the Alhambra

After the Alhambra, we walked back to our hotel, doing some souvenir shopping along the way. We passed a flamenco studio and got into a conversation with the salesperson, so we wound up getting tickets for a show that evening. I want to say it was good, but I really have no basis to make that statement, so I will just say that we enjoyed it. We then wandered around Granada looking for dinner until we found a restaurant with a menu we liked (or understood). Both of us had seafood. They also gave us some gazpacho.


Gazpacho with dinner.

The following day, the plan was to pack, find breakfast, briefly wander around the cathedral, and then check out at noon and have a car service take us back to Malaga, where we would spend the rest of the day before heading to the airport the following morning. We wandered around the shops again, and had chocolate and churros for breakfast. Brilliant.

The Granada cathedral did not open until 10:30, but that still gave us an hour to explore before we needed to head back to the hotel, which was pretty close to the cathedral.


Granada cathedral


Granada cathedral

It was nice. We explored the cathedral and the small museum in it, then headed back to the hotel. I checked out, and our driver was waiting for us to take us back to Malaga.