Espana

Well, the Spain trip was a blast, if somewhat suffering from less than ideal weather. 
We flew direct to Malaga: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Málaga
which is a popular site for British tourists.  It's a bit scrubbed up accordingly, but is pleasant, quiet and easy to get around.  We began with San Miguel beers and a giant pot of paella at a beach restaurant sitting by the Mediterranean:

The next day, rain spoiled our planned beach excursion, so we went instead to the local modest but still interesting Picasso museum (he was born in Malaga) and also the stunning cathedral:

 

 The next day we were off to Granada, a much bigger city with more cultural interest.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Granada

Perhaps the coolest part was when we wandered the Albayzin, the old Moorish quarter, which is filled with hookah bars, tapas restaurants, tea shops, and places selling tapestries, leather goods and assorted trinkets.  This is crowded with tourists, street musicians and locals and consists of winding narrow streets that go up the hill....

 

Culminating at a plaza at the top with a fantastic view of the city.  

All this culture meant that we had to celebrate with more tapas and wine.

 The chief attraction of Granada is the Alhambra Palace, a world renowned Moorish palace and UNESCO World Heritage Site:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alhambra

The place towers over the city and consists of wildly different palaces from different times and architectural heritages, plus some amazingly complex garden mazes.  Plus mini-aqueducts are built into the stairs so that water collected in vast pools at the top of the hill trickles down throughout the complex.  Not sure these pics do it justice:

Granada is also where Ferdinand and Isabella are buried, but sadly the cathedral was closed when we tried to go take a look.

It was a great experience--a bit tricky as Michelle's Mexican version of Spanish only sometimes translated to the European type (as I sat around shrugging uselessly, of course), and we also had the usual fun stuff of trying to figure our foreign bus depots and schedules and other assorted stuff.  But we both agree that Spain is a place we may have to be coming back to again sooner rather than later. (Barcelona? Madrid? Cordoba? Seville?)  Geez, there are almost too many damn options.....