Our epic trip through Spain in 2023 spanned a whopping 17-days. We spent months watching YouTube videos, reading blogs, and scrolling instagram to put together the best trip possible.

Now, I’m giving all my knowledge to you! We started in Barcelona, then went to Seville, Granada, Cordoba, and Madrid (where we day tripped to Toledo and Segovia). 

The first city of our trip, Barcelona, is detailed in its own blog. Be sure to start there! The next three days in our trip were spent exploring Seville. Here’s the quick overview before we dive in.

• Day 1-5: Barcelona
• Day 6: Arrive via train, visit Plaza de España and Maria Luisa Park
• Day 7: Royal Alcazar, Jewish Quarter exploration, Cathedral of Seville, Las Setas
• Day 8: Triana Neighborhood

Day 6: Arrive in Seville via train + Plaza de España and Maria Luisa Park

We took the 6-hour 8:35am train from Barcelona to Seville. Yes, it was early, but it was a direct route (no changing trains in Madrid) and we got to Seville mid-afternoon with plenty of time left to explore.

Our train said it had a cafe car, which technically it did, but it was out of like… 75% of their items. I highly recommend planning ahead and bringing your own snacks for the ride. Honestly, this was probably our biggest disappointment of the whole trip (which is really saying something).

We stayed at the Hotel Boutique Casas de Santa Cruz. It’s a 10/10 hotel for sure. The only con I can possibly think of is that the room was really small (but the bathroom was not, which was interesting). It also had a Michael Scott Dinner Party TV screen… if you know what I mean, haha. Otherwise, 10/10 staff, 10/10 for noise (I didn’t even hear another person there the whole time), 10/10 location (minutes [seconds??] from the Alcazar, right on Calle del Agua. We also got a welcome glass of cava when we checked in. AND there is rooftop access which is awesome, especially at night. Simply wonderful.

After dropping our things off, we walked to the Plaza de España and Maria Luisa Park. Plaza de España is truly breath-taking. The plaza appears in he Plaza de España Lawrence of Arabia (1962) and is featured as Naboo’s palace in Star Wars: Episode II (2022).

OH. And Brian and I got engaged here. BOOM. After he popped the question, we took some selfies and walked to the square outside the cathedral to share a bottle of cava.

Day 7: Royal Alcazar, Jewish Quarter exploration, Cathedral of Seville, Las Setas

The main attraction of Seville (besides the plaza) is the Royal Alcazar. Designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site, the Royal Alcázar of Seville is the oldest royal palace in Europe that is still in use today. It dates back to the 11th century, when the Muslim authorities decided to build a fortress in a strategic location to protect the city. The Moorish architecture is truly beautiful, as are the ceramics details which showcase one of the things Seville is best known for.

The gardens are also incredible. After you navigate the palace, take a walk through the gardens. If you’re lucky, you’ll see a peacock with her babies!

Make sure you get your tickets in advance. This is the biggest attraction in Seville and timed tickets are required to explore. I would allow yourself 3-ish hours to walk the palace and the surrounding gardens.

In the afternoon, we wandered around the Santa Cruz neighborhood, also known as the Jewish quarter. It’s just a labyrinth of streets no wider than your arm-span, connected by small plazas. Seville is such a beautiful, small city. In just a few hours, you can walk the main parts of it!

After a siesta, we visited the Cathedral of Seville. Here, we climbed the bell tower and enjoyed incredibly beautiful views of the city. The tower is quite the climb, though!

Inside the Cathedral of Seville lies the tomb of Christopher Columbus. All of the cathedrals we visited kind of ran together, but Seville’s is memorable because of this specific tomb.

At night, we went to Las Setas. Las Setas is a huge wooden structure / art piece. You can admire it from the ground, or you can purchase tickets and walk along the pathways on top. If you’re there for sunset, you can see it lit up in color changing lights. (Pro tip: check when sunset is before you head up there. It can be a lot later than in the states!) Las Setas gives you a 360-degree view of the city. Unmatched views.

Day 8: Triana Neighborhood

On our final day, we went to Triana. Triana is a Seville neighborhood just on the other side of the water. It’s a very doable walk – about 30 minutes all the way across the river to the Ceramics Museum and 30 minutes back down Calle Betis. Once you make it to the water, I would highly recommend paying the couple of euros it costs to tour the Torre del Oro. It’s a wonderful naval museum, first of all, but at the top, you can get panoramic views of the city!

From Torre del Oro, we decided to tour the bull fighting ring. It has a great museum, detailing the history of bull fighting in the area. You can also walk out into the ring. It’s kind of a surreal experience… so much torture and bloodshed happened there… and yet I can just walk around in the middle of it and take selfies. It was weird.

After the bull fighting ring, we crossed the river into Triana and visited the Ceramics Museum. We purchased combo tickets for the Alcazar and the Ceramics Museum, which allowed us to visit both within a day of one another. The Ceramics Museum is pretty cool – it’s built on the remains of an actual ceramics factory.

I would highly recommend going next door to Ceramica Santa Ana. This is one of the best places to get ceramic souvenirs.

For lunch, we ate at Bar Triana. It’s a cute little tapas bar on a neighborhood street. We ate one of our favorite dishes here – tomato salad with caballo fish.

We siesta’ed in the afternoon, and then spontaneously bought tickets to a flamenco show at Casa Del Flamenco. Seville is famous for flamenco, so I’d highly recommend seeing a show. The seating is super intimate and they don’t allow phones (only during the last song!) so you really get immersed in the song and dance. It’s too cool.

On to the next…

That’s a wrap on our days in Seville, Spain! Truly, my favorite city in the world (so far). After Seville, we took the train to Granada.