After cappuccino and pastry at Cafe Lisboa, we kill the morning until it's time to start walking to the Alhambra. Our tickets are for noon entry and we figure no more than thirty minutes to walk up the hill from the hotel.

The Alhambra requires some planning since tickets are limited. If you know the date you want to visit, morning or afternoon, and the time during this period you want to enter the palaces then buy ahead of time via Ticketmaster.

The Alhambra is big. It combines flower-filled gardens, fountains and pools and troughs of water, Moorish and Christian palaces, and on top of all this, there's also a fort. The whole is a mix of Moorish and Christian architecture set on a hilltop overlooking Granada. It's one pretty spot after another.