• 3 Dinner (D)
• 8 Breakfast (B)

• Toledo: At a Damascene workshop, meet a master artisan for an insight into this ancient craft. Witness firsthand their precision as they inlay gold and silver into iron, using a chisel and a hammer.
• Granada: Visit the Alhambra Palace with a Local Expert and walk through its courtyards, carved plasterwork and palace rooms from the Nasrid period. You’ll see how water channels, gardens and intricate detail define the complex, and how this hilltop site shaped Granada’s cultural and political story for centuries.

Insight Vacations

• Business class coach with extended leg room
• Top-rated dining, from farm-to-table to local restaurants
• 4 & 5-star stays

Join your Travel Director for dinner at a local Madrid restaurant and meet your fellow travellers over Spanish food and wine. The hosted evening offers a relaxed introduction to the people sharing your journey.

Madrid’s dining culture prizes conversation as much as the meal. Around the table, experience the capital’s convivial atmosphere and begin getting to know the group beyond the bustle of the city streets.

Meet a master artisan in a Toledo workshop and watch the precise craft of Damascene metalwork. Using a chisel and hammer, the artisan inlays fine gold and silver designs into dark metal, creating intricate patterns by hand.

Long associated with Toledo and shaped by centuries of Moorish influence, this decorative tradition demands patience and a steady touch. The workshop offers a close-up view of a skill still practised in the city today.

Explore Toledo with a Local Expert, walking its narrow cobbled streets above the River Tagus. Step inside the Church of Santo Tomé to see El Greco’s painting, The Burial of the Count of Orgaz, displayed in the church for which it was created.

Toledo’s lanes and buildings reflect its medieval Christian, Jewish and Muslim communities. Its former role as a Spanish capital gives the walk a rich historical setting, while El Greco’s work provides a vivid encounter with the city’s artistic heritage.

Explore the Alhambra with a Local Expert, examining the courtyards, carved plasterwork and water features of Granada’s hilltop palace complex. Visit the Generalife gardens, once a summer retreat for Nasrid rulers, where fountains and planted terraces frame views across the city.

The Alhambra’s palace rooms reveal the artistry and political ambition of medieval al-Andalus. Light, water and geometric ornament shape spaces designed for both court life and quiet retreat, making this a distinctive encounter with Granada’s layered past.

Choose a guided walk through Santa Cruz, Seville’s historic quarter of narrow lanes, small plazas and enclosed courtyards. A Local Expert helps you read the street pattern and details of a neighbourhood shaped in part by its medieval Jewish community.

The close-set buildings create pockets of shade and a quieter atmosphere beside the city’s grand monuments. This is one of two included Seville sightseeing choices, suited to travellers who prefer exploring the district’s social history on foot.

Choose a panoramic drive around Seville to survey its main districts and landmarks. See the riverfront near the Torre del Oro, the broad avenues associated with the 1929 Ibero-American Exposition and the green surroundings of María Luisa Park.

The drive offers a wider view of how Seville extends beyond its medieval centre, connecting its Guadalquivir river heritage with the ambitious public spaces of the early 20th century. It is one of two included Seville sightseeing choices.

Step inside Seville Cathedral to explore its vast Gothic nave and chapels, and see the tomb associated with Christopher Columbus. View the Giralda, the cathedral’s bell tower, which began as the minaret of the mosque formerly on this site.

Completed in the 16th century, the cathedral is recognised as the world’s largest Gothic cathedral. Its immense scale and reused tower make the site a compelling record of Seville’s transition from Islamic to Christian rule.

Try a few flamenco steps at Seville’s Cristina Heeren Foundation, meet students and watch a live performance of dance, guitar and song. The hands-on lesson reveals the rhythm and coordination behind an art form closely associated with Andalucía.

The foundation trains young artists and works to preserve flamenco traditions. Meeting its students adds a personal dimension to the performance, while the visit supports arts education through the foundation’s work.

Explore Évora with your Travel Director, discovering a Portuguese city whose streets preserve Roman and medieval layers. Visit the Capela dos Ossos, where human bones and skulls form part of the chapel’s interior decoration.

Created within the Church of São Francisco, the Chapel of Bones invites reflection on mortality rather than spectacle alone. Beyond it, Évora’s historic centre reveals the long continuity of a city shaped by successive generations of inhabitants.

Explore Lisbon with a Local Expert, taking in the orderly Baixa district and the riverside Belém Quarter. View the Monument to the Discoveries and Belém Tower, landmarks closely tied to Portugal’s maritime history along the Tagus.

Baixa’s broad, regular streets reflect the rebuilding that followed the 1755 earthquake. In Belém, the monuments recall the era of Portuguese ocean voyages; the tower’s fortified stonework marks the historic approach to the city by water.

Taste pastéis de Belém at the Lisbon bakery that has made them since 1837. Bite through crisp pastry into a warm custard filling, traditionally finished with a dusting of cinnamon.

The bakery’s closely guarded recipe gives this tasting a particular sense of place: these pastries are not simply a Portuguese café staple but a Belém tradition. It is a chance to experience the neighbourhood’s food heritage through its best-known sweet.

Visit the National Coach Museum in Lisbon to examine an exceptional collection of royal carriages dating from the 16th to the 19th centuries. Look closely at their carved bodies, decorative finishes and ceremonial details.

Built for royal travel, state occasions and diplomacy, the coaches reveal how public display formed part of European court life. Changes in their craftsmanship and ornament offer a visual account of shifting fashions, technologies and royal protocol.

Visit the Sanctuary of Fátima, one of Portugal’s most significant pilgrimage sites. See the Chapel of the Apparitions, associated with the reported appearances of the Virgin Mary to three children in 1917, within the sanctuary’s expansive gathering space.

The nearby Basilica of Our Lady of the Rosary and broad esplanade convey the scale of devotion the site attracts. Whether approached through faith or history, the sanctuary offers insight into an event that remains deeply important in Portuguese religious life.

Discover Salamanca’s Plaza Mayor, where arcades and warm golden stone frame the public heart of this historic university city. Learn about Salamanca’s academic traditions and see the Puente Romano across the River Tormes.

The bridge retains arches dating to Roman times, while the plaza reflects a much later chapter of civic life. Together they show the span of Salamanca’s history and the enduring importance of its streets and gathering places.

Explore within Ávila’s medieval walls and admire the towers and ramparts that still enclose the historic town. The stone defences give Ávila a striking profile against the rugged Castilian landscape.

Dating largely from the 11th century, the walls are among Spain’s most recognisable medieval fortifications. Walking inside them offers a direct sense of how a fortified settlement was planned, protected and lived in over the centuries.

Explore Madrid’s Old Quarter with a Local Expert, tracing the compact streets, market squares and civic spaces at the heart of the capital. See how the neighbourhood grew from a small medieval settlement into the centre of Habsburg Madrid.

Its changing street plan tells the story of a city expanding around royal and commercial life. Expert commentary brings those layers into focus, making the historic centre more than a collection of facades and lively plazas.

Share a hosted dinner with your Travel Director and fellow travellers at a local Madrid restaurant. Settle around the table for an evening of conversation and Spanish dining in the capital.

The meal is a social experience rather than a routine dinner: it brings the group together to exchange impressions of the places and traditions encountered across Spain and Portugal. Madrid’s lively restaurant setting provides a fitting backdrop for those conversations.

Visit Seville’s Pilatos Palace on an optional excursion and admire its courtyards and richly decorated rooms. Look for the blend of Mudéjar detailing and Renaissance design that gives this aristocratic residence its distinctive character.

Known as the Casa de Pilatos, the palace offers a quieter perspective on Seville’s architectural heritage than the city’s monumental public buildings. This experience is at additional cost and bookable on tour.

Explore the Alcázar of Seville on an optional excursion and discover a royal palace complex celebrated for its layered architecture. Also see Plaza América, where pavilions evoke the civic ambitions of the 1929 Ibero-American Exposition.

The Alcázar reflects centuries of changing rulers and artistic influences, while Plaza América presents a contrasting, early-20th-century vision of the city. This experience is at additional cost and bookable on tour.

Dine at a family-run Lisbon restaurant on an optional evening focused on seasonal Portuguese seafood. Enjoy a hosted restaurant experience that places local ingredients and the country’s Atlantic coastline at the centre of the table.

Seafood is a defining part of Portuguese food culture, from simply prepared fish to regional shellfish dishes. The family-run setting offers an intimate way to experience that tradition. This dinner is at additional cost and bookable on tour.

Explore the Portuguese Riviera on an optional excursion from Lisbon. Experience the coastal scenery and resort atmosphere beyond the capital, where Atlantic light and seaside surroundings offer a contrast to the city’s dense historic streets.

The excursion provides a broader view of the Lisbon region and its longstanding appeal as a coastal retreat. Specific stops are not detailed in the tour description. This experience is at additional cost and bookable on tour.