Looking towards Hayden & Andrea’s home in Calle Zahareña, Granada ES
Narrow Carrera del Darro, Granada ES
Apartamento Carretera Sierra, Granada from Wednesday August 7 to Monday August 12, 2024.
We are back in Granada to catch up with Hayden, Andrea and Brianna again.
However we are not staying at their place.
Months ago they organised some renovations, but it’s only now that the tradies have finally got around to doing it.
Our rooms are in a great location, with a small mini mart and a good coffee shop, Café Bar La Rueda, close by.
The coffee was only 3€ for both of us.
It’s not far to Hayden and Andrea’s place, in fact you can see their house from our balcony.
But it’s up a very steep hill, too steep to climb when it’s hot.
Currently the temperatures in Granada are hovering in the high 30°C every day.
Our time therefore consisted of coffee, shop and a bit of a walk around in the morning, then back to the rooms to stay cool.
We would then go out in the late afternoon or evening for a bit more of a walk and sometimes a pre dinner beverage.
Some nights we would go up the hill to have dinner at H and A’s, or cook at home in the apartment, then occasionally we would go into town and dine out.
We have been in Granada so often, that there aren’t that many sites we haven’t seen already.
So we really weren’t missing out on much.
During the ‘siesta’ time we booked our next and last adventure.
Again we were hiring a car, this time from Enterprise in Granada.
Then we would drive around Southern Spain and cross into Southern Portugal.
We were going to try and stay in the Spanish Paradores and Pousadas, as they are known in Portugal.
These are state owned luxury hotels that are usually housed in historic buildings.
We have used them in the past and they are great.
Many of them are out of town and have good parking and a restaurant.
But not all, so parking can become an issue.
We will stay for a few nights in each and make day trips to visit the local area.
‘Slow travel’ has become a favourite.
Always more than one night in every venue, more if possible. Then there is no rushed schedule to see everything in one day.
We are staying in a very residential part of Granada – there aren’t many tourists here.
This has its drawbacks.
We were going to have a pre dinner drink at our local café come bar. However when we arrived it was shut.
Strange.
We turned up the next morning and it was still shut.
They were on their Summer break and would be away for most of August. This is a common occurrence, in the non tourist areas.
There are so many small retail, businesses that take the month off.
We then found Café Bar Robledo, that was still open. It’s much further away but the coffee was still great.
And again only 3€ for the two of us, that’s less than A$5.
It had been a while since my last haircut and I was looking a little ‘Wooly’.
There was a barber, just a matter of meters away, so I popped in on the off chance of getting a cut.
They weren’t busy so I was taken right in.
The cut was just ok.
As my dad used to say: “The difference between a good haircut and a bad one is two weeks.” I guess I will now have to wait two weeks to look ok.
We did make one more visit to Capitan Amargo, the craft beer bar.
As usual it was great.
They do have over 30 beers on tap so there is a lot to choose from. Thea also found a white wine she liked but it was from a choice of 2.
Thanks Thea for indulging me in my passion.
On our last day in Granada we went out for a long, casual lunch.
It was still very hot, so we caught the bus into the centre and then walked down to a restaurant on the Darro River (Creek).
It looks up at the Alhambra but we couldn’t see it, as we were under the awnings that was keeping the sun out and keeping us cooler.
At the end of the meal, which was very pleasant, I had a coffee but Thea went in search of an ice cream and we ended up at Los Italianos.
We had been here before in 2022 and it is definitely worth the search.
We are off on our final adventure tomorrow.
Driving around Southern Spain and Portugal.
