Visiting Phil's sister in Spain

Helen & Antonio and children

The Alhambra, Granada

We haven’t seen Phil’s sister, Helen, and her family for just over a year and that was only when our separate visits to dad at Christmas in 2010 coincided for a couple of days. So it was good to be able to spend a week with them in their flat in Granada, Spain.

It can be cold in Spain too

Eating out

We spent time just being together, wandering around the centre of Granada, going up into the Sierra Nevada and doing a half day walk with Helen. The
weather is nearly always hot in Granada but it was colder than normal. The Sierra Nevada area has snow until after Easter.

Making a snowman with the last snow

Cycling in the park

We all drove up to the Sierra Nevada for a walk around the area where one of the ski resorts is. It was over 3000 meters and there was still quite a lot of snow left. Not enough for the children to rent a sledge but enough to play around in.

The Monachil path got narrow in places

On one of the days, Helen had the day off whilst the children were at
school and Antonio was at work. Since it was a clear day we decided to
go for a walk on one of the trails from Monachil. It was hot when we left the car and Helen was a bit worried that she might get a headache as she sometimes does whilst exercising in the heat. She used the acequia water to cool her head down. Acequias are ingenious ancient water channels that the Moors built hundreds of years ago to transport mountain water down to their villages and towns. They are still fully working today.

Part of the cathedral in Grenada

Since we were going to be walking away from the acequias for the rest of the trail, Helen filled her empty water bottle with cold water for pouring over her head later. At the end of the walk we stopped in a traditional country bar for refreshments. 

Granada old town

Normally we like to visit the Alhambra when we are in Granada but this time we were unlucky. All the entry tickets for the day were sold out. Instead we spent our time wandering around parts of Granada that we haven't seen before. There are lots of narrow interessting streets to explore in the old part of town.

We tried to learn a bit of Spanish from Helen's children although they weren't too impressed with our efforts. We will be travelling to South America in a couple of months and hope to attend a Spanish language school to kick start our Spanish whilst we're there. Hopefully the children will be a bit more impressed the next time we meet.

Next we're off to Bath, England, to visit Phil's dad to celebrate his 80th birthday.