Alhambra

In the Hall of the Ambassadors (Salón de los Embajadores), look up. The dome is built from 8,017 interlocking pieces of wood, a geometric image of the seven heavens, and it rises 18.2 metres above the floor where the sultan held audience, the height of a six-storey building. Next door, the Court of the Myrtles (Patio de los Arrayanes) is laid around a single pool 34 metres long, hedged with myrtle on both sides. In the Palace of the Lions, twelve marble lions carry the basin of the fountain, and the dome of the Hall of Two Sisters breaks into at least 5,000 muqarnas pieces.

The walls are written on. Qur'anic verses and court poetry run through the carved stucco, and some poems speak in the first person, as if the room were talking. From the palaces on the northern wall, low windows look out over the Albaicín. The Generalife gardens lie outside the walls to the east.

• Bring your passport or ID. It is checked against your ticket at the main entrance, at the palaces and at the Alcazaba.
• Wear proper shoes and carry water. The grounds run up hills, down stairs and over stone paths, and they are larger than they look.
• Allow the time. A visit runs from two or three hours to six.
• Tour tickets may be collected somewhere other than the main entrance; check where before the day.

Buses stop at Palacio Emperador Carlos V, about 100 m away, and at Alhambra - Puerta de la Justicia, about 150 m away. A taxi to the entrance saves your legs for the hours of walking inside.

On foot from the city, the main approach climbs through the Alhambra Woods on the south side of the hill, entered by the Renaissance Gate of the Pomegranates (Puerta de las Granadas).

Driving, there is a paid car park and paid street parking, with wheelchair-accessible spaces. The two closest car parks, about 60 m and 240 m away, are permit-only.

Best: early morning, with a morning slot for the Nasrid Palaces. In winter the elms are bare and the plan of walls and towers reads more clearly.

Avoid: the middle of the day in summer.

Heat and crowds both build towards midday, on a site you cross on foot for hours.

Pushchairs are allowed on the grounds but not inside the palace buildings or the Alcazaba, and baby backpack carriers are refused there too; both go into the lockers. Along the northern wall, the small palace-towers such as the Torre de la Cautiva and the Torre de las Infantas are not normally open to visitors.