It's been a long time from my last Paris' trip I wrote you about! Now we are dreaming about next March going to Seville, Spain. As always, I am looking for an affordable one bedroom/comfortable studio apt. in Seville (we also plan to visit Cordoba, of course, and flamenko is number one on the list!). I am kindly asking you for any advice on the rental place in Seville (ground or first floor only). We usually cook all our meals. As for the ticket - my guess is that the right time to start will be on Jan. 2 - is this true? Never been in Spain but always used your help with Italy and France - many thanks again! I never go any where without visiting this site! Sure, we are on budget ... no wonder why this time! Many thanks to you all in advance - Dina Arnolda
If you are going to cook all your meals in, it would be worth finding an apartment outside of the tourist center, I think. I know when we stayed in the Barrio Santa Cruz, we had to walk quite a ways for groceries (though we could have been looking in the wrong place.)
There are lots and lots of vacation rentals in Sevilla which is good - and I hope you get some good insights here.
As for buying your ticket... when I know I am going, I just plug my dates into Orbitz every day - as soon as I see a low fare, I grab it!
Thanks a lot for such a prompt response! I smiled reading your advise about staying outside of the tourist center because we certainly don't like any noisy places! We are really, really slow travelers and like to stay in one place doing some day trips. I will read all review, and in the meantime I will look into seville5.com for rentals, I read a lot about it on this site (including trekcapri's/Kathy wonderful report - I love it!). I will follow your advise about looking for our tickets, we are thinking about the first half of March (though have no idea about March weather there but will learn for sure!). Will keep you posted, love your site and community, and I always sent my brief reports and rental reviews too.
Hi Dina, you will so love Spain and especially Sevilla. I read thoroughly the reviews here and found them so helpful. I also used seville5.com and found them very easy to work with and very responsive to my e-mail inquiries. I'm still working on all my reviews including my Seville Apartment so I will just mention here that I went with Arfe # 2 on Seville5.com. Although I really loved my apartment and would stay there again, IMHO it may not agree with what you are looking for because the immediate area was not very quiet. But I'm sure you will find good possibilites here on ST's reviews as well as from other members.
Have a wonderful trip!
Posts: 790 | Location: California | Registered: 19 September 2004
Thanks much, we are going to use this weekend to look into seville5.com. Usually out tickets come first but I think that this time we may look into rentals before the tickets, my guess is that we have to wait for a better airfare till holidays are over. Thanks for the rental site, it is always good to know who is reliable! Also, I adore food markets. In Rome we rented near Campo dei Fiore, and in Paris we stayed nearby street markets in Sainte Germaine (parisbestlodge.com) and walked to Louvre - great location! We plan to make day trips from Seville and I am sure I will have more questions then including how to buy discounted train tickets online, I was confused). Great thanks to all, Dina
If you like food markets, you might consider staying in or near the Triana district - they have a food market there, called the Mercado de Triana. If you google it, you can see more info and some pictures of it.
We stay in Barrio Santa Cruz every time we visit Seville and love it but it is noisy, pretty much everywhere in our experience. I would have difficulty sleeping with the windows open because of the noise. By way of comparison we stayed right on Campo de Fiori last year and found that quieter. Obviously the precise location of the apartment, the bedroom and its orientation would make a difference. I note you want ground or first floor so you would really need to consider the noise issue. I have no experience with staying anywhere else - we must venture out of our comfort zone one day!
We have used sevilla5 several times and found them and their apartments excellent. If you plan on doing some serious cooking, look carefully at the kitchens as none of the places we have rented in Seville have had much more than a kitchenette, which has been fine for us as we generally only have breakfast there but would not have been great for cooking full meals.
Wow, if Campo dei Fiori was quieter, we really have to stop thinking about our comfort at night, and it is Spain after all! Alas, this time one flight of stairs only wanted (five fligths in Rome were before my husband's angioplasty). I have already contacted seville5. and found them very responsive - thanks for yout tips as always. I will look into Barrio Santa Cruz very carefully tonight.
As for our cooking then we are very light eaters, and I think that if any kind of oven/dishwasher/microwave is there then it is fine (to be honest it is for the sake of our budget only, I hate cooking, so, no huge meals are ever expected from me, and in Rome our favorite spots were those tiny grocery shops around Campo market with tons of warm food - heavens!)
Now is major concern are our tickets - what do you think will be the best price for Madrid? So far we have not seen any direct flights from Chicago. Also, is there any boat trips in Seville? (similar to what Paris has along Sienne, it was one of the most celestial boat excursions in my whole life).
Eliza, Shannon, Kathy, Jil, and other members - many thanks.
Just to clarify re the comparison with Campo de Fiori - had our bedroom not faced into an inner courtyard and we been on the top floor (5th I think) we may have been more disturbed by noise. Personally I still think Seville is noisier in some places as there are so many narrow streets and small plazas and the sound bounces around, whereas central Rome has the bigger plazas but perhaps more traffic noise.
Each of the places we have rented in Seville have had windows onto a street or plaza, so maybe this is something to check, along with double glazing as that can make a big difference. It is not that common though.
We stayed in an apartment on the first or second floor in Seville last July with a very noisy street below - we slept with the windows closed and the aircon on and were fine but then I have adjusted to sleeping with earplugs and the noise of a generator!
Wow! I thought that nothing could be noisier than Rome but we survived somehow. Thanks for your advise, I am in contact with couple of agents in Seville and still learning some areas. Santa Cruz looks fascinating for me, we'll see. For sure, price does matter and we are going to be pretty flexible considering this sensitive issue. Thanks a lot!
As to your question about flights, Chicago to Madrid, there is the daily AA or Iberia, Direct!gets you into Madrid early in morning, so that you have the whole first day there. KathyK
Tickets fewer! Is AA reliable? Someone mentioned here that US airway is not. I always used Lufthansa but never AA. I will appreciate your experience! My trip to Seville is in March, and I am flying from Chicago to Madrid. Many many thanks!
I have used AA often, both in country and flying to Europe and especially to Spain. I like AA - as much as a human can like an airline - and am very used to their system so for what it's worth.... The DIRECT ORD to MAD is a code share, so that you are actually on an Iberia plane. The good thing about that is you are served wine with your in flight meal! I don't know if going to Iberia's site you can get a better price for the same route though. kathyk
Kathy, thanks so much, I will look in AA too after I have read your info.
Many thanks to all of you who were so kind to share your info with me. I will be back with new questions about my trip after I am done with my tickets! Fondly, Dina
Is it better to fly Chicago - Seville, or take a train from Madrid to Seville? It looks like the price for two train tickets is around $420. I could not believe my eyes! Now I am just wondering whether it's better to fly directly to Sevilla! Did anyone have any experience with this dilemma? Thanks so much, Dina
Hi, Check to see what Easter Week is. Last year it was early...in March. For a whole week before Easter starting on Palm Sunday thousands of people come to Sevilla for the many many religious processions with life sized floats of scenes from the passion of Christ and honoring certain saints. It was a facinating experience seeing all of the families that find special places to watch the floats go through the narrow streets. But it was also a little overwhelming especially when streets were totally blocked off and we couldn't get to places that we wanted to go. It was sometimes so crowded in the streets that we had no choice but to follow the direction of the crowd. I'm glad we experienced this time, but now sure I would recommend it to others for a first time visit. It is a fascinating part of Spain though. So glad you are going there.
This message has been edited. Last edited by: Kim,
What a coincidence. We are also planning our trip to Spain in March. WE are flying from NJ, but my son, who studies in Chicago, will fly direct from Chicago to Madrid in Iberia. We have not purchased his ticket yet, but for his dates is around $780.
For the AVE train Madrid-Sevilla they offer a couple of discounted rates, which have to be purchased in advance. The "Web rate" is around 27-30 Euros one way, the "Estrella rate" is around 40 euros one way. This compares to a Regular rate of 67 euros one way. I believe you have to buy your tickets at least 21 days in advance.
If you are going straight to Sevilla you should price Iberia from Chicago to Sevilla and see how much that would be. It might not be that much more that the train and since you are already at the airport it is easier. They would transfer your bags for you to the Sevilla flight.
We will be 5 days in Madrid, where we are renting an apt. Then we will probably go north, to Santiago de Compostela. I know, it sounds counterintuitive to go north in winter, but I love Santiago and really want to go back.
I just checked the ORD-MAD rates in both Iberia and AA codeshare. For the dates I'm looking at , if you book through AA it costs around $100 more than Iberia! So check both!
We took the AVE train from Madrid to Seville and used the web discount price...the earliest you can buy the tickets on the web is 62 days (to the day) before to get that discount which is what we did. It was well worth the discount.
I think our 2 tickets one way using the web discount from Madrid to Seville was €70.82(for the 2 of them).
Posts: 733 | Location: USA | Registered: 08 June 2008
You all have my great thanks! We have researched all options offered by your wonderful experience, and I personally agree that it might be easier just to fly Chicago - Seville (the cheapest has two stops)rather than by train. It depends on the price of our airline tickets. I tempt to wait till Jan. 2 to end my hunt for the tickets but we continue starting days on web search. Jil -great thanks for your hint on the web discount for the trains. Gloria - Easter 2009 will be at the beginning of April, so we will be fine in early March, we always want to avoid any crowds! Maria - wish your son a good trip from Chicago- I work at the Northwestern University, is he by chance our student?! Again, thanks to you all, I feel that after all I am fully equipped for now, and my only goal is to sit on top of my computer and watch for a dream bargain price. I made a promise to myself to end my search on Jan. 3. Dina Arnolda
I know, it is tough to figure out the best timing to purchase tickets. We were lucky to get FF tickets on Continental for the 3 of us out of Newark. My son is at the University of Chicago. He is arriving today for Winter break. I told him in the next few days we have to figure out if he can fly out on Friday or has to wait until Saturday (it depends if he has a final or not on Friday) as I really want to buy his ticket and get it over with.
We are checking tickets twice daily. Another question is that how to buy web discounted tickets from Madrid to Seville? Our first choice is to fly Chicago - Seville but we want to have another option as our back up. My husband found the link but we could not figure out how to purchase through it. I know it is 60 days in advance but I just want to confirm the right link and right steps. Many thanks as always! Dina
Wow, we have found the link how to buy discounted train tickets Madrid - Seville, please disregard my previous message - thanks a lot! As I understand, this discount applies one way only, and I suppose that on the way back from Seville we have to buy a full price ticket - is this correct? Thanks!
As far as I know the discounted rate can apply to both segments, as long as it is available ( I believe they don't offer it on all the departures and they might be capacity controlled). I have never bought myself a train ticket on the Renfe website, have bought them in person while in Spain. My understanding is that it can be very frustrating to use the website and that many times it will not accept US credit cards.
Arnolda...when you buy the discounted tickets on the renefe site they are quoting you for a one way fare...do not I repeat do not buy a round trip ticet...instead buy 2 one way tickets to get the web discount fare and you have to wait the 62 days to do that too...ie if you want one on may 1 to go buy for that date if you want for june first to go back buy for that date the 62 days ahead...there is an number you can call to help you if you have problems...I posted it on another thread here but I can't remember the phone number...it was on the thread that had to do with buying tickets to barcelona.... On Trip Advisor in the Madrid forum there is a how to buy tickets on renefe website that is very good and detailed...it is what I used to buy all of my rail road tickets in Spain.
I hope this helps...
I found the phone number (0034) 902 15 77 07
Posts: 733 | Location: USA | Registered: 08 June 2008
I live in Sevilla and can recommend a couple of options for you.
First of all, a neighbour of mine rents holiday apartments in the Barrio Santa Cruz. If you specify that you want somewhere quiet he will be able to advise you. He's just changed his website and I don't have the new URL but I'll post it asap. Meanwhile, this site also has quite a few apartments... Sol On Line
There are supermarkets and markets near the Barrio Santa Cruz (within a ten-minute walk). You mentioned making all your meals but it would be a shame not to try the tapas while you're here. Depending on the place, it's sometimes cheaper to eat out than buy the food and prepare it at home. I have a tapas blog that might interest you and can let you know which ones are inexpensive... Sevilla Tapas
Are you flying from Chicago? You might want to try Chicago-London-Sevilla and avoid having to take the train from Madrid altogether. Clickair flies to Seville daily and has very cheap flights. And there are usually good deals to London from major cities in the US and Canada. Just a thought. Click Air
If there is anything else you'd like to ask, feel free. March is a great time to come and you'll miss the madness of Semana Santa (in April next year).
Maria, Jil, Azahar - your info is precious! I am at work right now and can't sort it right away but tonight we will think all recommendations over. I won't make it without you! I hesitate to rent an apt. without our tickets in hands. Jil - my husband indeed found a very detailed info on how to buy train tickets online (2 pages of instruction!) - it looks so complicated! However, after I have read all your updates today, we will think about it. Thanks for a nice tip on the rentals! This area is very attractive! Of course, we will eat tapas out, no question about it! (honestly - we are very healthy eaters but hamos will be a must! (yesterday we rented all Rick's movies about Spain and almost fainted... so much food!
Hi Dina, even though it is 2 pages long it is very good. I read it then I just followed it along for a trial run on something i did not care about and did not hit pay....so that made it easy...
as far as click air goes that is who we flew from Venice to madrid (they also flew to Sevilla but i did not know that at the time) it was very easy to fly with them...we had no problems...and tapas are wonderful... we often had them for lunch and then bought simple stuff for dinner at the apartment...in case I haven't said it lately...we loved Seville....
Posts: 733 | Location: USA | Registered: 08 June 2008
Hello to all my Seville's supproters- We got the tickets last midnight! It is Lufthansa (through cheaptickets) with one stop in Frankfurt (just two hours in between) arriving in Madrid at 10:00am. The only minus is that on our way back it is 6:00am departure from Madrid but I am thinking about leaving for Madrid on the day before and staying nearby airport for one night (actually, for a half of night!). Later I will ask you about some day trips from Seville because we are going to stay there two weeks (versus our first idea about one week, actually two weeks are cheaper to rent).
Thanks to you all for your "emotional" and very informative support during our torture with the tickets! Alas! We can't keep with today's prices...
Now we are in rentals, and then we will buy our train tickets (yes, 61 days in advance!), and then I will be with you again for our itinerary!
Thanks! We jumped to two weeks because nowdays it takes so much to go to Europe that we never know if we go again, and on top of it when you rent for two weeks your daily rate for the rentals is lower. We will stay in Seville and later I ask Azahar for his daily trip hints! I am more concern about our place now. I have an emotional connection with Bizet and will try to settle not so far from Tobacco factory!
I live about a 7-minute walk from the tobacco factory, in the barrio Santa Cruz. If you like you can PM me when you've found an apartment online that you like and I can tell you a bit more about the location, if it's a quiet street, etc.
Dina we did a day trip to Cordoba and I can't recommend it enough for the Mezquita...no place like it anywhere we have ever been.... and a very easy train trip that we booked on line...
Posts: 733 | Location: USA | Registered: 08 June 2008
Yes, we do plan Cordoba but it is interesting what you think about Mezquita! Thanks for the tip! I am in my renting agony right now, and somehow I am attached to sevilla5.com, mostly because so many people from this site rented there, and again, we are on budget, and their site has a few affordable places. Azahar - we are looking at the San Andreas, San Pedro, Mariano de Cavia, Caballero on sevilla5 - they don't give the street names (just a brief description) and it is hard to imagine what is there. I am sure that all members will benefit from such kind of info. Great thanks, Dina
Congrats on your plane tickets! I still have not bought my son's ticket from Chicago- Madrid. I'm afraid that if I get him a connecting flight he will never make it! So the only other option is the Iberia flight which is still quite high $$$.
We are also planning to stay at a hotel near the Madrid airport for the last night. We have made reservations at the Hotel Clement Barajas which gets good reviews in Tripadvisor and has also been recommended in the Fodors message boards. They have a shuttle to/ from airport 24 hrs a day( you have to make reservations though) Their website is www.clementhotels.com
Dina, if my memory serves me right there is a map on the sevilla5 site that not only shows where the apartments are but what is near them...if you can't figure it out email sevill5 and they will help you do i(that is what i had to do) but I found that helpful to making decisions... we also thought that things really do seem closer then the do on these maps...
Posts: 733 | Location: USA | Registered: 08 June 2008
Out of the apartments you listed the one on Mariano de Cavia looks the best in terms of location. You'd be about a five minute walk to the barrio Santa Cruz, just over 10 minutes to the Tobacco factory. It's in an area called the Arenal. Lots of great tapa bars and not far from the Arenal Market and the Corte Inglés (supermarket). One drawback is that there is no washing machine, which is very handy to have, especially for a two-week stay.
Did you look at the one on Arfe? That's just around the corner from Mariano de Cavia and is on a very nice non-touristy street (though not sure if you'd get street noise at night). From the photo it looks like you'd be either above or across the street from a little bakery, butcher's and fruit & veg shop. It's also close to the the Arenal market and Corte Inglés. And it says there is a washing machine in the kitchen.
When you click on "More Apartments" they show one called Plaza Santa Cruz, which is a bit more expensive than the other two but is in the heart of the barrio and looks very nice. You'd be a bit farther from supermarkets (15 minutes) but the San Bernardo market is about a 5 minute walk from there. And the Tobacco factory is just around the corner.
It's absolutely no problem for me to give Sevilla5 a call and ask to see any or all of these apartments - they are all very close to my house. Just let me know.
Dina, Months ago,I had asked about economic and nearby hostales around Barajas. Casa Santo Estevo posted this which I am keeping in my back pocket in case I need it on my next flight into Madrid airport. Not as plush looking as the one you found, but for the price...
Trying to catch up with everything, many thanks to you all!
Maria -I have found Iberia to be very expensive but a big plus is that they have a direct flight. We will go through Germany but around $200 less per person, it means a lot for us. I am sure your son will make it ok through Frankfurt, there are tons of people speaking English, he will be fine, no doubts. I have checked Hotel Clemente and they did not give me any availability for my day. I will check Kathy's link, nothing really matters for one night in Madrid but the price (it will be the end of our stay as well!), and we only need a bed for a few hours because our flight to Chicago is at 6:00am.
Azahar - so many thanks for your detailed info, I am in a close contact with sevilla5 and we are considering a few options there (I agree totally about washing machine, we did not think about it!). I still have one extra question about one location - it is Plaza de Las Mercedarias. We can see on the map that it is a little bit far (and yes, from Tobacco factory too but I will have to sacrifice my dream!) but as Jil said in a reality some places looked better than on the map.
if this Plaze is fine then we will add one more choice to our listing, and I want to make a reservatin ASAP just to be done with it. It takes so much time!
It took me awhile to find the Plaza de las Mercedarias apartment - I didn't realise there were a whole bunch of other apartments if you click on "Long" stay (duh).
It looks like there are a few apartments on the Mercedarias page, none of them actually in the Plaza de las Mercedarias. The one on Vidrio isn't a great location for going home at night, or at least I wouldn't feel comfortable. Alejo Fernandez might also be a bit dodgy.
Did you see the apartments Ximinez de Enciso and Virgenes? Those two are more central and look quite nice.
Wow! what a precious info, thanks so much! We sit right now looking at all, it is no better than buying a plane ticket. I will report when something works out (Ximinez, etc. are not available for us).
For what it is worth we stayed in the Arenal area not far in terms of walking distance...we stayed at the Redes apartment not the roof top one but one on the second floor but they had a lift...it was ok but for long term not sure.. but location for us was really good...we walked everywhere from there...I am really giving you the apartment so you have an idea of where were...right across the the street from the art museum...
Posts: 733 | Location: USA | Registered: 08 June 2008
