Spain Again 2, The Alhabrambra

The girls arrived on the Sunday to glorious hot sun. It’s the usual suspects, me, Clare, Chris, Margaret, Vicky and this time Anna (her first visit).
They had a few days acclimatising to the heat, swimming the the sea and pool and generally mooching about eating ice cream in copious amounts. In fact discussion was dominated by ice cream most of the time.

We also had to pick up another car as mine would not take six and for some reason it was cheaper for two cars than for hiring a people carrier.
Anyway, the first proper trip was to the Alhambra. This is one of my mums favourite places I believe and also on Clare and my bucket list, (or in my case a tipper truck load list).

A Potted History of the Alhambra.
Its a palace or rather a series of palaces that overlook the city of Granada. It was built on Roman remains and was  built mostly between 1238 and 1358, in the reign of Ibn al-Aḥmar (Nasrid Dynasty) and is important Islamic Architecture. The interiors are hard to describe they are so decorated with all the walls and ceilings carved and presumably at one time very coloured.
The Moors were expelled 1492 by Isabella and Ferdinand ( the King and Queen at the time) and much of the interior to the palaces was ruined or removed.
Charles V, (In Spain called Charles 1st) rebuilt parts in a Renaissance style with an Italianate Palace.
In 1812 some of the towers were blown up by a French forces, during the Peninsular War (War of Independence), and then 9 years later an earth quake took its toll.
The architect José Contreras in the  1830s started to  restore the amazing buildings and this continues to today.
The area is high in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada but, also hot and so the palaces were full of shaded places, moving water, still pools, reflections, marble and beautiful gardens.
So imagine this, in the throne room, there are high ceilings and huge carved lattice windows set back in alcoves. In those alcoves vessels of water would be placed to catch the breeze to cool the room.

The gardens would have been planted by the Moors with roses, oranges, and myrtles and the gardens have been replanted to reflect this and my goodness they are sumptuous and fragrant.. In fact the scent was astounding when we arrived, the carpark was shaded by orange blossoms and it was all most cloying.

Chris had been to the gardens before and therefore was just happy to wander into Granada for a time while we struggled with the signs, which are not consistent and made our way into the garden. Of course nothing is straight forward for us….women of a certain age, we forgo the stunning views for the first ten minutes and all pile into the toilet!

Eventually we waft gracefully around the gardens. Clare was the only one of us dressed appropriately for to waft in the regal atmosphere. 

I’ll let pictures tell you the rest……

I think we were all had Palace fatigue at the end and after a slight lost-in-wonderland feeling as we tried to navigate out.

Margaret and I stayed on in the garden of the Generalife (another palace) because we had missed a small section.

All in all a wonderful place that I would be happy to revisit.