Spain and Portugal trip for one month

Spain | Jul 2 - Aug 1, 2023

Very nice hotel in the central part of Granada. Its a heritage building and unique. The staff was very helpful.

The hotel is excellent and the staff helpful. The breakfast included was very high quality. The car access to the hotel is not the best and this will only impact people driving.

Good hotel. Room was tiny. Nicely located. Breakfast was good. Staff is very helpful.

Location is great. Hotel looks renovated - in a unique style. Breakfast was below average. Food quality and variety was limited.

Hotel is very basic - and did not fit the quality fo the other hotels on the trip. Room was tiny with very basic amenities. Almost like a hostel. Breakfast was limited in quality and variety. One day they were 30 minutes late in opening and our tour got a bit delayed.

Nice hotel - rooms are good size and comfortable. Breakfast was good. Location is excellent.

Probably teh best hotel choice on the trip. Excellent room, great service, very nice restaurant and wonderful staff.

Very good tour. Great views of the city. However, the walking was a bit much. The walk back from the hill (with the funicular) back to Old Town seemed repetitive and if possible could be avoided.

Great exposure to the pinto culture of San Sebastien. Good choice of restaurants. Food was great and so were the choice of wines.

Excellent tour of Rioja wine country. Choice of wineries was good. Laguardia was also good.

We had a great time on this tour with the same guides as for Rioja. Gaztelugatxe was excellent. The walking tour of Bilbao was also good. However, I think the tour can be modified to allow for more time at teh Guggenheim. We got only 1 hour and 15 minutes which was not really enough. Some time could have been reduced at both Bilbao and Gaztelugatxe to allow more time at Guggenheim.

One of the highlights of the entire trip! The experience of seeing the "running of the bulls" was exhilarating. IT was short trip since we had to return to San Sebastien to catch a flight. But we were able to see the running of the bulls from a balcony. The hosts were very nice and provided us with a basic breakfast. After the running, we walked the entire route and got a good look at the town of Pamplona. There was an amazing party atmosphere with thousands of people attending the festival.

Alhambra is fantastic. The history, architecture and the way it has been maintained is wonderful. The tour was well conducted by our guide.

This flamenco performance is different (in a good way) from the typical flamenco dances one sees in restaurants and other places. The ladies are not dressed in the fancy clothes, they dont use castanets for sound of the beat. Instead they are dressed in plain dress that perhaps were the type won by the people in teh villages who danced flamenco. It felt very authentic and original.

Cruise around the port of Malaga was good. Compared to all the other activities that were in small groups, this tour was on a large boat which was quite full and crowded. However, people were having a good time. We enjoyed it for teh views of the Mediterranean sea, and the city and its surroundings.

Beautiful city walking tour with Pedro. Seville has a beautiful town center. Alcazar has some similarities with Alhambra in Granada but has its own charm. Again, great history. We had a nice lunch in town before walking back to our hotel.

After seeing Alhambra (Granada) and Alcazar (Seville) and Alcazaba (Malaga) we thought Cordoba might be similar. But as we stepped into the mosque/cathedral in Cordoba we were awe-struck. This place is perhaps the most beautiful historical site in all of Spain. The beauty of the architecture fo the building and the combination of the mosque and cathedral is just magnificent.

Lisbon is a beautiful city and very walkable. This tour is a must do when in Lisbon. Our guide, Filipa Santos, did a great job in explaining the history of Lisbon and some fun facts like how Ian Fleming was inspired to create James Bond while in Lisbon. Seeing the different neighborhoods and their unique characters was very interesting.

Riding in a tuk-tuk was fun - a bit touristy but worth it. The highlights of the tour was the Belem tour (a must see in Lisbon) adn tasting the pastels in the 1837 bakery that makes and sells them. It would have been better to spend a few more minutes at the monastery which has some amazing architecture rather than at the shops in the converted factory.

This walking tour was one of the highlights of our trip to Portugal. The food and tour of the neighborhoods was so educational. Lisbon has a great history with the intermingling of so many cultures. The food on the tour reflected that history and heritage.

Definitely worth doing this trip to Sintra and Cascais. Sintra ia a beautiful town in the hills. The weather was lovely. The beaches near Sintra were also beautiful. Cascais was more like a beach resort town and somewhat touristy. We had a nice lunch at a local spot in the hills that Paolo, our guide. knew. The food was fantastic there.

Obidos is a cool medieval town. We had a nice walk thru the town, stopping at some of the small shops along the main street. The views from the ramparts fo the fort were beautiful as we looked out on green farms all around. Nazare' is a very nice beach town that is known for its wide and long beach. In winter, the waves are ideal for surfing although at this time in teh summer the Atlantic was very calm. We had a nice lunch along the beach and then got some good views from the top of the cliff looking down on the beach.

Porto is a beautiful small town. We had a good walking tour of the city ending near the river. We then had lunch at a restaurant along the river and visited one of the tasting centers for port wine. As teh gateway o Douro valley its a must see town in Portugal.

Douro Valley is an amazing place to grow grapes for wine. It is a large valley with the Douro river flowing through it. Very picturesque. Vines are planted all the way to the top of the hills. The river cruise was beautiful - very peaceful. The best part of the day was the wine tasting. We were taken to a small privately owned winery. Our host treated us to the wines from his estate which were excellent and also to a homemade lunch which was also excellent. We then took a short walk through his vineyard to get a first hand look at how they grow grapes and some of the challenges they face.

We went to 4 different tapas restaurants and tasted their specialty tapas in each. From garlic shrimp to tuna on toast and many other delicacies we got to taste some excellent tapas and drink some wonderful wine. A great ecperteince because these were not the typical tourney places.

A very nice walking tour of the center of Madrid. An educational trip to learn about the history of the city and its evolution. We saw teh palace from outside) adn various neighborhoods.