Flying to Granada from the Midlands

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The Sunday Times opens its travel clinic on a daily basis to answer your holiday queries. Today: getting to the Alhambra


I've long promised to take my wife for a short break in Granada, to see the Alhambra Palace. Are there any flights from near where I live? - Peter Davies, Birmingham

Sunday Times travel expert Richard Green responds: Yes, Ryanair (www.ryanair.com) flies from East Midlands to Granada. It also flies there from Liverpool and Stansted too.

A good place to find out how to get to a particular European city from your local airport is JumbleFly (www.jumblefly.com), or the slightly more complicated to use, DoHop (www.dohop.com).

However, Ryanair only has three flights a week from East Midlands to Granada and competition for seats, especially in the summer, can mean that it is difficult to get good value fares, unless you book a very long way in advance.

But don't worry too much if the flights are already expensive on the days you are looking at. Malaga is a good alternative airport, 80 miles to the southwest of Granada. It's a pleasant 90 minute drive from Malaga airport, and all very well signposted. You follow the coastal motorway and the turn north past the brooding Sierra Nevada mountains, still on motorway standard roads, through steep sided valleys and on into Granada.

And the great thing about Malaga is that is has a huge number of flights and airlines flying into it, from over 20 UK airports. You may well be able to find cheaper fares to Malaga as well, thanks to the vast number of seats on offer. For departures from Birmingham, Coventry and East Midlands, try Bmi baby (www.bmibaby.com), Thomsonfly (www.thomsonfly.com), Monarch (www.monarch.co.uk), Flythomas Cook (www.flythomascook.com), Easyjet (www.easyjet.com), and Flybe (www.flybe.com).