Andalusia by train with friends: 6 nights through Seville, Córdoba and Granada on high-speed rail

We left Atocha mid-morning with all four tickets bought together and in advance—the way to get a deal. Two and a half hours of AVE gives you time for a coffee, a quick nap, and for Rocío to walk us through her list of bars scribbled in a notebook. At Seville-Santa Justa station we headed straight downtown: our hotel was a five-minute walk from the Cathedral, so we dumped our bags and hit the streets.

We spent the first afternoon getting the feel of the city without rushing. We got happily lost in the Barrio de Santa Cruz, the old Jewish quarter, with its narrow winding streets that suddenly open onto little plazas lined with orange trees, their scent still hanging in the air. You don't need to see anything specific: the idea is to wander, let yourself drift, and watch the night fall between whitewashed courtyards.

For dinner we had earmarked a tapas crawl through the area, nothing binding. Nacho was set on El Rinconcillo, which proudly claims to be Seville's oldest, dating to 1670, with hams hanging from the ceiling and the tab scrawled in chalk on the bar. Pringá, spinach with chickpeas, a sandwich of cured ibérico pork and an ice-cold beer: that's how you close day one in style.

The big day in Seville started early, with our Real Alcázar ticket already purchased online and in hand for first entry. This isn't just any suggestion: it sells out hours ahead, and getting there early pays off—you wander the courtyards almost alone. The Alcázar is Europe's oldest royal palace still in use, and you feel it: tile work that dazzles the eye all the way to the ceiling, the Patio de las Doncellas reflecting in its pool, and gardens where Bea spent half an hour chasing peacocks. Pure Andalusian calm before the crowds arrive.

From there, it's a short walk to the Cathedral. It's the world's largest Gothic cathedral and it shows: the nave dwarfs you and the climb to the Giralda—included with entry—goes up ramps instead of stairs, designed so a horseman could ride up on horseback. At the top, all of Seville spreads out below you and the bells ring right beside your ear. Nacho lived out his dream that day and reminded us of it for the rest of the trip.

That evening we crossed the river to Triana, the neighborhood where flamenco was born, for a tablao show. We'd booked ahead because they fill quickly, and we got lucky: a small intimate place, no microphones, where the foot-stomping echoes off the wooden floor and hits you in the chest. We left without words, which says everything about this crowd.

On day three we switched cities without stress: the Avant between Seville and Córdoba takes barely forty-five minutes, so we left mid-morning after a leisurely breakfast. We dropped our bags at the hotel—one of those old palace-mansions right in the Judería, steps from the Mosque—and spent the whole afternoon on what we came to see.

The Mosque-Cathedral is hard to do justice with words. You walk in and you're greeted by the famous forest of columns with their red and white arches repeating as far as you can see, a masterpiece of the Umayyad Caliphate that leaves you spinning trying to look everywhere at once. And in the middle of it all, a Renaissance cathedral built inside centuries later. We'd booked our ticket online to secure a time slot and skip the queue. Rocío, who doesn't know much about art, went quiet for a long while, and that says it all.

Walking out, we lost ourselves in the Judería, the medieval Jewish quarter, until we stumbled on the Calleja de las Flores, that narrow lane lined with blue flower pots framing the Mosque's tower at the far end. Here Andalusia preserves its only medieval synagogue, small but full of history. We closed the day on a patio terrace the way they do in Córdoba, with a fountain in the middle and geraniums climbing the walls.

We made good use of the morning on day four before catching the midday train. Ten minutes from the Mosque stands the Alcázar of the Christian Monarchs, the fortress where the Catholic Monarchs lived during the Reconquest. The best part isn't so much the walls as the gardens: long pools, fountains, manicured hedges and rows of cypress trees. An hour and a half of easy walking and back to the hotel to grab our bags.

The AVE to Granada takes an hour and a half, and by mid-afternoon we were settled in the historic center, in an 18th-century mansion with the Alhambra peeking out between the rooftops. But the real postcard moment we saved for sunset: we climbed into the Albaicín, the Arab quarter, winding our way uphill through its cobblestone corners until we reached the San Nicolás Viewpoint.

And there it was, straight ahead, the Alhambra in full view, glowing gold in the last light of day with the Sierra Nevada as its backdrop. There are guitarists, people sitting on the low wall, a murmur of languages, all eyes on the same view. Bea had been waiting months for that moment and it didn't disappoint. We made our way down as night fell, hungry and ready for the big day ahead tomorrow.

We'd bought our Alhambra ticket weeks in advance—we'll tell you more about that below because it's the single most important thing about this whole trip—and the day finally arrived. Our time slot for the Nasrid Palaces was in the morning, so we headed up with time to spare. The Palaces are the heart of everything: plaster ceilings that look like stalactites, walls carved like lace, courtyards where water flows through the finest channels and reflects everything. The Patio of the Lions, with its fountain and arcades, is where we lingered longest.

Next we climbed to the Alcazaba, the military fortress, the oldest part, from whose towers you can see all of Granada and understand why they chose this hill. And to finish, the Generalife gardens, the sultans' old summer retreat: hedges, roses, fountains crossing through the air and that constant murmur of water that accompanies you the whole way. It's a long half-day of walking, so comfortable shoes and plenty of water are essential.

We came down exhausted but happy. In the afternoon nobody wanted more monuments, so we left it free: siesta for some, a last stroll for others. Andalusia is also about knowing when to stop.

Our last full day we dedicated to Granada unscheduled. In the morning we went back to the Albaicín in daylight, which is another experience entirely: the cármenes with their hidden orchards, the little plazas with their wells, the views that peek through between houses. It's a UNESCO World Heritage neighborhood and you get it by wandering unhurried, letting each uphill stretch lead to the next.

But the afternoon had one goal only, Rocío's favorite: tapas crawling. Something magical happens in Granada that the rest of Spain envies: a free tapa comes with every drink. You order a beer and they bring you something to eat at no charge, so three or four rounds and you've had dinner. We worked our way through Calle Navas and Calle Elvira, the main bar streets, moving from place to place, drink after drink, tapa after tapa. We tried the remojón granadino—orange, salt cod and olives, better than it sounds—crispy fish and a Pampanilla stew that left us rolling.

It was the perfect goodbye to the trip: no reservations, no schedules, all four of us bar-hopping until dark fell.

If you take one piece of advice from all this, let it be this. The four star monuments—the Alhambra, Real Alcázar, Seville's Cathedral and Córdoba's Mosque—all require online booking and they sell out, so don't leave them for last minute under any circumstances. We bought them in this priority order and it worked out perfectly: first the Alhambra, which fills up fastest (the Nasrid Palaces can sell out months ahead, especially in peak season); then the Real Alcázar in Seville; then Seville's Cathedral, to secure a good time; and last the Mosque in Córdoba. All have official ticketing websites.

Trains are the same: book ahead and the AVEs and Avants between cities run from just a few euros per person, while from one day to the next they skyrocket. Book all four tickets for the group together so you can sit near each other and lock in the promo rate. And a honest note about typical late-September weather in Andalusia: by that point summer heat has eased, afternoons are pleasant and nights call for a light jacket, but at midday the sun still beats down hard in Seville and Córdoba, so bring water, a hat and seek shade during the hottest hours. Finally, even though it's domestic travel, we took out travel insurance: it covers last-minute train cancellations, baggage and emergencies, and pays off if anyone in the group has non-refundable tickets.