La Alhambra...it is pretty, no?

Yesterday I went and visited la Alhambra of Granada. It's a cultural and historical landmark and people come from across the world to see it. Because they do, it is Spain's second most visited spot.

I'm all about visiting a city's landmarks, but have felt oddly blasé about la Alhambra. The reasons for this are several: tickets are hard to come by as only 7700 are sold per day, you have to wait in line for several hours for the possibility of buying them, and they cost a whopping 30 Euro. (Or $46-ish.)

Absolutely none of that sounds appealing to me. However, a trip is included in our program. I thought I'd missed my chance to go and would therefore have to suffer the ticket drama, but the people in charge scheduled another visit. YAY!

I'll spare you the details, but my nearly three hour trek reminded me of how much I utterly despise guided tours. (Really, how many churches can one see?)

Here's why:

1.) Unfortunately, I have a short attention span.

2.) So many people in one space makes me spazzy. I blame my mom on this one as she also lacks an affinity for crowds.

3.) Being shuttled from one spot to another sort of takes the charm out of visiting a special location.

Don't get me wrong, la Alhambra is beautiful and it's a gorgeous example of Islamic architecture. Also, it's set in one of the prettiest areas of Granada. I am glad I went to see it; I know I'd always regret not visiting. I just wish we lived in a world where people could visit monuments freely.

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