It’s been hectically busy lately, and I’ve been away most of this week for work, but we’ve still had some time to cast our minds briefly towards our trip to Spain which is in a few weeks’ time.

Nicole – who’s already been to the land of paella, bull-fighting and Dali – bought a Lonely Planet guide to Spain a wee while ago, and I’ve been doing my best to do a bit of revision on a country I am not much of an expert on.

I’ve learned a lot from the “History” chapter, which – like in all Lonely Planets – is thorough enough to give a sense of what and who the country is, but brief enough to be digestible; one of the reasons I like that series of guidebooks.  Spain boasts a huge array of cultural influences, from the Romans to the Moors, and I am excited by the prospect of the rich cultural and architectural legacy in places like Cordoba or the world-famous Al Hambra (and no, I don’t mean the theatre in Bradford).

I even discovered that Hadrian, the Roman emperor famous for his wall built to keep the Scots out, was Spanish.

What I’ve read has begun to whet my appetite for the trip, and we’ve started to make some serious plans for a journey that will see us fly into and out of Madrid and spend most of our time touring around inland Andalucia.

I was somewhat perturbed, then, to read the following under the heading “When to visit”:

“During July and August, temperatures can climb to 45c in inland Andalucia; at this time Madrid is unbearable and almost deserted.”

Ah.