Steady, Cam.

DavCam and SamCam on holiday in Granada this week. Ideal wrote this sweet article saying that although SamCam's birthday is really during Semana Santa (18th, apparently), they'd come early for a bit of peace. I like how it assumes that British people would know to avoid Semana Santa, but doesn't acknowledge that we've got a referendum on. Anyway, they had plato alpujarreño in a restaurant in the Albaicin.

Yes, you can drink the water.

This is a turn-up for suspicious British tourists throughout the Mediterranean. Granada officially has the best tap water in Europe, and by extension - probably - the world. Story here, but as it's in Spanish, the sort of people who won't drink the water in Spain won't read it.

Every city should have ...

...a big fountain to leap around in when your team wins. Unfortunately, Granada's teams tend not to win much, so people leap around in the Fuente de las Batallas (just off Acera del Darro, and near El Corte Ingles) when Real Madrid win instead. The other night though, it was the national squad beating Italy in the quarter finals of the European tournament that brought 3,000 Granadinos out to get soaked. I don't profess to know anything about football, but it appears that Spain's getting past Italy is a bigger triumph than if they win the trophy itself next week, against whoever. Here's the fuente with some revellers in and around it.

CCTV Nazari

It seems a shame the authorities feel compelled to install hideous CCTV cameras in the Alhambra to "protect (both) the visitor and the monument" (story here, in Spanish), and I hope they manage to make theirs more discreet than the millions that blight the urban landscape of Britain and which do sod-all to reduce drink-fuelled anti-social behaviour. I've never noticed so much as a low-key graffito anywhere in the palace or the Generalife gardens, and it doesn't look like there's much of a problem to me. Of course, it may save money (once the cameras are in they'll cut staff hours). Ideal will no doubt be looking into that. There will certainly be an awful lot of footage of Japanese tour groups, and swallows. Of course had the Alhambra been built in the UK it would have been bristling with cameras years ago. And it would probably be closed for Health and Safety reasons anyway.

Granada on-line

This is rather cool. Granada's new website allows citizens to register, apply, pay, complain, query and otherwise generally mither the life out of the town hall at the click of a mouse. If you've ever attempted to set up a direct debit to pay your water and refuse-disposal charges in Spain, only to be sent to several provincial government offices and two banks, you'll know what a step forward this is. The site is largely geared for residents but the "turismo" tab may be interesting to visitors. There are links for Alhambra tickets, the city orchestra, temporary exhibitions etc. Unfortunately the function for searching for tapas bars by area doesn't work very well. Maybe I should post a list of some good bars here sometime... http://www.granada.org/.