Hola, it’s me.
Last month I finished my master’s program, so OBVIOUSLY it was time for a celebratory trip to relax in the sun, so my friend and I set off to Spain and Portugal.
London Stansted (get that fast track security, you won’t regret it) —> Seville
I’m gonna be real honest with you, this hangry body really struggled with the meal schedules in Spain – 10pm is bedtime, not dinner time. Thank goodness for sangria, tinto de verano, olives, and jamón. It would have gotten ugly without them.
Day 1 we arrived and immediately went in search of said sangria and olives, and quickly found them.
We quickly inhaled these, then moved on to G&Ts by the river (thanks Spain for not restricting your liquor pours like England), then as the sun went down, we hit up the rooftop bar at EME Catedral Hotel for drinks and views. While taking in the view and having cocktails, you better believe I ate all the bar nuts I could get my hands on, but I still struggled to wait for restaurants to open for dinner.
We got some tapas for dinner, then immediately went back to our hotel and went to bed. No fiesta for us. The exhaustion from writing a dissertation was real.
Luckily, after checking the HOT weather forecast for Spain, we changed our hotel last minute to have a rooftop pool at Fontecruz Sevilla Seises. That decision saved us. We tried to do some exploring in the mornings at Plaza de España and Real Alcazar de Sevilla, but for siesta time, we hit that pool hard. Day two I learned from my hangry mistakes of the previous day and picked up a jamón baguette and some chips for afternoon snack time.
I won’t lie, this pool was my favorite part.
After many pool naps, and other random exploring, on our last night we caught the sunset from Setas de Sevilla, and immediately after, found my favorite tapas restaurant of the trip. Perro Viejo was delicious. I ate all the food too fast to show you, but trust me on this one.
Here’s a few more photos from our wanderings in Sevilla (before we would get too sweaty and go back to the pool).
From Seville we rented a car and made our way to Lagos, Portugal. Portugal was my jam, mostly because they let me eat at earlier hours like the old woman I am, but also because the Algarve region is a beauty. We stayed at Carvi Beach Hotel and the location was perfect.
We didn’t do much exploring in town in Lagos because we were either at the beach or at the pool, but we did find one restaurant we loved so much, we ate there both nights for dinner. Jugs of sangria + restaurant on a cliff overlooking the ocean + that tuna tartar = HEAVEN. Mar Restaurante & Bar is doing great things, if you’re in Lagos, go there.
We explored the cliffs a bit more in Lagos, and almost died on the stairs down to and up from one of the beaches.
The whole time in Lagos, I kept researching how to see the Benegil sea caves. I finally figured out a solution, so after checking out of the hotel in Lagos, we made a stop on our way back to Spain. There are quite a few options to get to the caves, but I wasn’t loving most of them. There are a lot of group boat and kayak tours that will take you, but you aren’t able to get out of the boats and fully into the caves. I also looked into private boat tours, but they are at least €300 and are still very short and not guaranteed you can get out in the cave. Another option is swimming from the beach. I NOPED out of that option immediately. It’s about a 10-15 minute swim and I am not an great swimmer + the ocean is terrifying + there’s a LOT of boats coming and going from the caves. Ultimately, we settled on renting a kayak and it was perfect. If you go with the kayak option, be sure to have a waterproof bag for your belongings, or leave them in the car, you WILL get soaked.
From the sea caves, we made our way back to Spain to Vejer de la Frontera, one of Spain’s white cities. It was beautiful, but very hilly, so be prepared. Also, don’t trust Google maps when it tells you you can drive down roads, your car won’t fit and you’ll have to back out of the road, not that that happened to us…
This was a quick stop since we spend time at the caves in the morning and the drive was longer to get back to Vejer, so we just explored a bit, got some drinks, then bought wine and food and went back to our AirBnb for the night.
Our last destination of the trip was Jerez, where we booked a couple activities for the day. We started off at the Andalusian Equestrian school for a show, where we quickly realized this activity was not for us and decided to leave at intermission so we didn’t have to rush to the next activity.
From there we had booked a tour at Tio Pepe for some sherry tasting. Don’t forget your heartburn pills for this one, kids. The tour with extra tastings (4 total) and a small plate of tapas was very reasonably priced, only about €20 per person.
We spent some time at the pool at our hotel in Jerez, then did some shopping (definitely not at a Nike outlet) and had a gourmet last meal while watching Harry Potter in the hotel room. Just doing my part to try the Taco Bells in different parts of the world and report back…you’re welcome. Sorry to say still no cheesy gordita crunches were consumed, you have to go to America for the good stuff.
Adios mis amigos.
tothandcotravels.com 