join the johnson journey: sampling southern spain

...and I AM BACK! Guys, the past seven weeks have been insane. One huge trip to Spain and Portugal, one medium trip to Italy, some friends coming to Hamburg and one smaller trip to Bratislava. It was insane! I am finally catching up on my blog. Luckily I am back in Hamburg for this weekend so I am trying to catch up or at least start :)

NOTE - make sure you read throughout as I've broken it up by days and there is text in between pictures

On Friday September 16th, Nick and I headed to Spain! We headed via plane to Malaga. Let's just say the day started off with a mess and a half. About everything that could go wrong did, haha. We almost missed our train to the airport. Then the security line was absolutely insane. RyanAir said we needed to get our boarding pass stamped because we are not from the EU... then we ended up not having to. Then we finally got through boarding and we waited forever to get on the plane. Then the flight attendant told us we indeed did have to get our boarding passes stamped and took our passports which made me really nervous. And then the plane in front of us hit a pack of birds so we could not land. And then Hertz royally screwed us over. Oh... and then we hit a bat on the way to our hotel. HAHA! So anyways it was a great start to the trip. Nick had to tell me calm down more than once and he finally got to me and I started to try and chill out. We got to our hotel right after midnight and hit the sack.

On Saturday morning we headed to the Caminito del Rey. This was so amazing. This is a hiking trail that is attached to the side of a gorge. The views are incredible. This was about three hours of walking on the trails and looking over the gorge. There was even a suspension bridge. After we finished our hike, we grabbed some lunch at the hotel and took in some great views. We then got in the car and headed to Ronda. Ronda is a cute little town with this amazing bridge. Once we checked into the hotel we took a long walk around the small town and grabbed an expresso. We then headed down to get a great view of the bridge. WOW. We ended the night with dinner and wine. Great night in a quaint little town of Ronda!

starting the hike by entering a cave

why so serious?

amazing sun reflection

rocking the hardhats and smiles

suspension bridge

view from our hotel in Ronda

nick in the streets of Ronda <3

nick thinks my hair looks funny.... so he took a picture!

On Sunday morning we headed to Granada. On the way we stopped by a city called Montefrio. Montefrio is this cute little town with this amazing rockface and church on top. We pulled over for a few minutes and took in the view. This little old Spanish man came up and tried to speak Spanish with us for a long and I think we both looked thoroughly confused, but it was fun! :) After we grabbed a bite to eat we headed to Granada. Granada is a stellar place. We had this great AirB&B that had a direct view of the Alhambra. Absolutely breathe-taking. When we got into Granada, we just started to walk around for awhile and then headed to the Saint Jerome Monastery. Unfortunately you are not allowed to take pictures instead this magical place. So all our memories are imbedded into our heads. Then we went up to the top of the hill that overlooks Granada and watched the gorgeous sunset. Then we decided we needed to eat! So we headed back down and walked around in the Arab Spice Market area called Alcaiceria for awhile. We ate at a Moroccan restaurant called Restaurant Arrayanes for dinner. The food was phenomenal!! Considering this area of Spain is so close to Morocco it has some amazing Moroccan food.

arab spice market

Moroccan food!

alhambra by night

In the morning we headed to Alhambra. This is the most visited site in Spain. I took WAY too many pictures which you can view below. The tile work is just incredible at this place. Everything is so detailed and the beauty is never-ending. There was always a surprise around the corner. After spending a long time at Alhambra we went to a yummy lunch where I tried my first gazpacho. Then we saw the incredible cathedral in Granada. So gorgeous! On our last night in Granada, we had this absolutely insanely good 19 course meal + 5 glasses of wine with our amazing chef Francisco. This guy is a dang genius! He has this teeny place called La Oliva that only holds 8 people and serves them all local, authentic Spanish tapas and wine. It was one of the best meals we had the entire trip. This was recommended by a friend from GT and we recommend it to EVERYONE. If you go to Granada you must absolutely go here and please make a reservation!