Granada: Things besides the Alhambra

In Granada, our airbnb host let us know that (in her opinion) the Sevillians act a little bit superior about their city, but that Granada is "far more charming".

Our apartment in Granada is situated in the only part of the city which retains the old Moorish style of architecture (called the Albaicin area).

Here's a view of the apartment, and the large attached balcony.

Our little area's winding, cobblestone streets and white plaster facades certainly were charming.

On our first day we walked uphill until we couldn't anymore and found a nice mirador overlooking the city.

A few blocks from our house we discovered a bustling narrow street lined with Moroccan restaurants, pastry shops, and street vendors.  Down a quiet side-street we found this restaurant:

 The proprietor greeted us in Spanish, but quickly switched to English, and then to French as he chatted with the couple coming in behind us.  His accent in English was impeccible (and, so far as we could tell, in French as well).  We later asked him how many languages he spoke, and he said English, Spanish, German, French, Italian, and an Arab language we didn't catch the name of.  He was very charming, and made a stream of small jokes — to a table of girls from LA, "oh, your're from Beverly Hills?  Give me a minute to raise the prices, please!", to the couple next to us "if you need any help, or need me to recommend the most expensive things on the menu, please just ask!".

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We both enjoyed really friendly service in this neighborhood, and suspect it's because of Maria's background. At one point, we bought some breakfast items at a small Indian grocery and the man ringing us up was very interested in where Maria was "really" from (and surprised that with parents from Karachi, I only spoke Gujarati). He threw in a couple of free chilis with the rest of our purchase. We also stopped in at one of the pastry shops selling all kinds of baklava variations and had a lovely interaction there with the clerk who explained that the name of one of our selected pastries was based on it resembling a bird's nest (it was delicious).

All in all, we rarely found it necessary to leave our small part of town, though that means we likely missed out on other, very different parts of Granada.

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As an addendum to this post, we are very proud to have figured out how to take the bus to the airport as it was very poorly marked and a completely different system than the other bus system in town (which had numerous, clearly marked route maps).  We're getting pretty good at this!