The Reality of Tenerife: The Town That Crossed the Atlantic
There is no gate waiting at the end of the straight street. In San Cristóbal de La Laguna, up on Tenerife’s northern…
Regional Guide
Spain
Spain travel ideas and guides: top destinations, things to do and insider tips, with cheap flight deals to make your Spain adventure easy.
Cheap flights to Málaga: let the train line choose the room
Before I book Málaga, I want the hotel pin on a map. The airport sits on a commuter railway that can carry…
Cheap flights to Tenerife: the two-airport split and the trade-wind cloud deck
Landing on an island in the Atlantic sounds simple enough until you realize the destination operates through paired commercial airfields built in…
The Reality of Málaga: Stone, Salt and the Unfinished Tower
Málaga never cleared the ground before it built. The Moorish fortress on the hill stands on Roman marble because its masons carried…
The Reality of Bilbao: The City That Bet Everything on One Building and Won
In October 1997, on a derelict riverfront bend previously occupied by rusting port warehouses, rail sidings, and decaying timber yards, the city…
Cheap flights to Bilbao: the airport with no train, the coach that goes to San Sebastián instead, and the four doors into the Basque Country
Most travelers flying into northern Spain for the first time arrive with assumptions shaped by Madrid and Barcelona. They expect Mediterranean warmth,…
The Reality of Valencia: The City That Took Its River Out of the Middle
Stand on one of the old bridges in the middle of Valencia and look over the parapet. There is a river under…
Cheap flights to Valencia: the metro inside the terminal, the supplement that runs both ways, and the Sunday morning with no bus
Valencia's airport does the thing almost no airport does. The train station is not a shuttle ride away, not at the far…
Cheap flights to Madrid: one airport, two worlds inside it, and the month the city walks away
On one of my early transcontinental trips, I booked a self-transfer connection through Madrid-Barajas Airport, arriving on a legacy carrier from North…
The Reality of Granada: The Last Emirate of Europe
In January 1492, the keys to the city of Granada were handed over on a hill outside the walls, bringing the final…
Cheap flights to Barcelona: the T1/T2 split, the “Barcelona” airports that aren’t in Barcelona, and the train that beats the taxi queue
On a return trip from Barcelona, I took a taxi to the airport and asked the driver to head to Terminal 1,…
The Rhythm of Seville: Flamenco, Heat, and Andalusian History
Walk down a narrow, whitewashed lane in the Barrio Santa Cruz at dusk in early spring, and two things will hit you:…