Granada neighbourhoods: what each one is really like

We work every day between Plaza Nueva and Calle Colcha, so this guide is not written from a map. It is written from the habit of walking up and down these streets, which is what really separates one Granada neighbourhood from the next. The distance between two points in the centre is almost never the problem. The problem is the hill in between.

What are the neighbourhoods of Granada?

Granada is officially divided into eight districts —Albaicín, Beiro, Centro, Chana, Genil, Norte, Ronda and Zaidín— and each one groups together several neighbourhoods. The territorial boundaries of the eight were approved by the City Council plenary on 26 January 1990, and the update was published in the Official Gazette of the Province (BOP) on 28 June 2013.

What almost nobody tells you is that those names do not match the ones a traveller uses. The Realejo is not a district: it is a neighbourhood of the Centro district. Neither is the Sacromonte: it is a neighbourhood of the Albaicín district. And the Alhambra, which everyone associates with the Albaicín because the two face each other, falls on the Centro district side: the Puerta de la Justicia is in the Realejo Alto neighbourhood.

This table puts together the two things worth knowing about each place: which neighbourhood and district it falls in, and how high it sits.

Twelve specific points on the Granada street map, each with the neighbourhood and district OpenStreetMap places it in and its height above sea level. The height difference is its elevation minus that of Plaza Nueva.

Landmark	Neighbourhood	District	Elevation	Height vs Plaza Nueva
Abadía del Sacromonte	Sacromonte	Albaicín	810 m	+110 m
Puerta de la Justicia (Alhambra)	Realejo Alto	Centro	770 m	+70 m
Mirador de San Nicolás	Albaicín Alto	Albaicín	765 m	+65 m
Barranco del Abogado	Barranco del Abogado	Centro	765 m	+65 m
Puerta de las Granadas	El Mauror	Centro	740 m	+40 m
Camino del Sacromonte (the caves)	Sacromonte	Albaicín	740 m	+40 m
Paseo de los Tristes	San Pedro	Albaicín	710 m	+10 m
Plaza Nueva (baseline)	San Matías	Centro	700 m	0 m
Campo del Príncipe	Realejo	Centro	700 m	0 m
Cathedral	Sagrario	Centro	695 m	−5 m
Calle Navas	La Manigua	Centro	690 m	−10 m
Palacio de Deportes	Los Vergeles	Zaidín	685 m	−15 m

What is the Albaicín?

The Albaicín is the medieval neighbourhood that occupies the hill facing the Alhambra, and it is the inhabited part of Granada declared a World Heritage Site. UNESCO’s inscription dates from 1984 for the Alhambra and the Generalife, and was extended in 1994 to include the Albaicín.

The UNESCO listing explains why rather well: it describes the Albaicín as the residential quarter of the ensemble, a rich repository of Moorish vernacular architecture into which traditional Andalusian architecture blends harmoniously, and places that hill and the one the Alhambra stands on as the medieval part of Granada. Put another way: the Albaicín’s value is not in any one monument, it is in the whole and in the shape of its streets.

That is exactly what makes it hard going. From the Mirador de San Nicolás to Plaza Nueva is little more than 600 metres in a straight line, but in between you cover 65 metres of height difference on cobbled lanes, many of them stepped, that simply will not take a car; on foot the route is considerably longer than that straight line, because no street goes straight up. You go up slowly and come down fast, and it is not a place for dragging luggage or for anyone with a dodgy knee.

What is the Sacromonte and how does it differ from the Albaicín?

The Sacromonte carries on from the Albaicín eastwards, already on the Valparaíso hillside, and it is a neighbourhood of the Albaicín district in its own right, distinct from the Albaicín Alto. Two things that are often confused are worth separating: the Camino del Sacromonte, which is where the caves and the life of the neighbourhood are, sits some 40 metres above Plaza Nueva —the same as the Puerta de las Granadas—; the Abadía, at the top of the hill and by then almost two kilometres from Plaza Nueva in a straight line, sits 110. Anyone who reads “the Sacromonte is 110 metres of height difference away” and applies it to their accommodation gets a fright they do not deserve, and the other way round too.

What sets it apart at a glance are the cave houses dug into the hillside, clearly visible from the Paseo de los Tristes looking up. And what sets it apart when you walk it is that you do not get there through the Albaicín: you get there by following the river along the Carrera del Darro, on the flat, as far as the Paseo de los Tristes, and only then does the climb start. The classic mistake is trying to cross from the Mirador de San Nicolás to the Sacromonte along the top, assuming that since you are already high up the rest is flat. It is not: they are two different ridges, and from the viewpoint to the Abadía there are another 45 metres of climb.

What is the Realejo?

The Realejo is the Centro district neighbourhood that occupies the southern slope of the Alhambra hill, and it is the most deceptive of all in terms of effort. The Campo del Príncipe, in the heart of the neighbourhood, is at the same elevation as Plaza Nueva, so you cover the lower part without noticing. Not the upper part: the Realejo climbs towards the Alhambra to the point that the Puerta de la Justicia belongs to the Realejo Alto neighbourhood, 70 metres higher up. And the Barranco del Abogado, still in the Centro district, is 65 metres above Plaza Nueva: as high as the Mirador de San Nicolás, even though nobody counts it as part of the Albaicín.

For us, no other neighbourhood balances so well the two things that usually pull against each other here: being inside the old town and not living on a permanent slope.

What is the Centro of Granada?

The Centro is the flat, commercial part, and it is literally below Plaza Nueva. The Cathedral sits 5 metres lower and Calle Navas 10: not much on paper —in fact, it fits within the model’s margin— but enough that, coming from the old town, the feeling is always of going down to do the shopping and up to go home.

This is where the Sagrario neighbourhood is, with the Cathedral, and this is where the tapas streets converge: Calle Navas, 240 metres from our front door in a straight line, appears on the map as another neighbourhood, La Manigua, though nobody calls it that. It is also where you eat what the menus give a Granada surname —the remojón, the olla de San Antón, the tortilla del Sacromonte—, set out dish by dish in the typical food of Granada. It is the part of the old town with the widest streets and also the least distinctive: take away the Cathedral and it could be the centre of any Andalusian city.

And the Zaidín, the Ronda and the rest of Granada?

The Zaidín, the Ronda, Beiro, Chana, Genil and Norte are the Granada where people live, and they have little to do with what a visitor comes looking for. They are further down —the Palacio de Deportes, in the Zaidín, sits 15 metres below Plaza Nueva— and, above all, they are outside the old town. There the elevation stops mattering and something else takes over: the daily journey.

We say it plainly because it saves us grief: if you are coming for three days to see the Alhambra and the Albaicín, staying in the Zaidín or beside the Camino de Ronda is a bad idea however cheap it works out. If the stay is a long one, if it is for work or if you are coming by car, then they do have to be considered seriously, and that is what we set out in the guide on where to stay in Granada.

There is one reason a visitor does cross that line on purpose, and it is at night: the university area of Pedro Antonio de Alarcón and Plaza de Gracia is right there, outside the monumental quarter, and it is one of the areas covered in where to go out at night in Granada.

How does one neighbourhood connect to the next?

The whole historic centre of Granada pivots on Plaza Nueva, and that is the most useful practical fact in this guide. Stand there looking upriver and the only flat axis opens up at your feet —the Carrera del Darro towards the Paseo de los Tristes— and the three climbs begin: the Albaicín to the left, the Alhambra to the right up the Cuesta de Gomérez, and the Sacromonte straight ahead. Almost any comfortable route between two old-town neighbourhoods involves dropping to that elevation and climbing back up.

These are the straight-line distances from our front door at Plaza de Cuchilleros 14, where six of our apartments are. They are not walking routes: on foot it is always more, because no street in the old town runs straight.

Straight-line distances from Plaza de Cuchilleros 14 to 8 Granada landmarks. These are not walking routes.

Destination	Straight-line distance	Terrain
Plaza Nueva	20 m
Granada Cathedral	290 m
Calle Navas	340 m
Paseo de los Tristes	680 m
Puerta de las Granadas	290 m	Uphill
Puerta de la Justicia (Alhambra)	540 m	Uphill
Mirador de San Nicolás	630 m	Uphill
Alhambra access pavilion and ticket office	1,080 m	Uphill

• Uphill: the route climbs a noticeable slope (the Alhambra hill, the Albaicín hill).
• Plaza Nueva: Measured to the mouth of the square, which is where you are already in it. Its centre (OSM way 877473370) is some 60 m further on.
• Granada Cathedral: Measured to the door, not to the middle of the block: the building centroid (OSM way 124069145) is 20 m closer.
• Calle Navas: The tapas street. It is a long one, so the figure is to its middle: the northern end is closer.
• Paseo de los Tristes: Reached on the flat, following the Carrera del Darro.
• Puerta de las Granadas: Foot of the climb to the Alhambra up the Cuesta de Gomérez. The real hill starts here.
• Puerta de la Justicia (Alhambra): The monumental gate of the Alhambra. OSM has a second node of the same name on Paseo del Generalife (node 7191318925), 55 m to the south-east.
• Mirador de San Nicolás: High up in the Albaicín. You get there up steep, stepped lanes.
• Alhambra access pavilion and ticket office: The furthest point of the site, to the east. The "Alhambra Generalife - Taquillas" bus stop (OSM node 6326087073) is 50 m to the west.

Read it alongside the elevation table and you understand the whole centre of Granada. The 290 metres to the Puerta de las Granadas look like very little, and indeed they are, but between our front door and that gate there are 40 metres of climb, and the real hill, the Alhambra one, starts right there. The Mirador de San Nicolás and the Puerta de la Justicia fall at similar distances —730 and 620 metres— but in opposite directions and up two different hills: doing both on the same day means coming all the way down one to go all the way up the other. And the stretch along the Darro to the Paseo de los Tristes is the only long one you do without puffing: 790 metres and barely 10 of height difference.

And in that same table is the part that does not favour us. The Alhambra’s access pavilion and ticket offices are at the eastern end of the site, 1,150 metres from our front door in a straight line and uphill: it is the furthest point on the whole table, more than three times the Puerta de las Granadas. Being in the old town is not being at the gates of the Alhambra, and no accommodation in the centre is, ours included. If what you want is to sleep next to the ticket offices, we are not your place.

Where does this fit when it comes to booking?

It depends on what you have come to do, and that is why we do not settle it here: this guide explains what each neighbourhood is, and the decision of where to sleep, with its trade-offs of noise, hills and luggage, is in the guide on where to stay in Granada.

The one thing we will say up front, because it is geometry and not opinion, is that the strip between Plaza Nueva and Calle Colcha is the ground level of the old town: from there you climb to everything without having climbed anything yet. It is exactly why our tourist apartments in the historic centre of Granada are there, and three of the ten —Plaza Nueva Studio, Hermosa 7 and the Suite Mulhacén, the one in the photo above— also look out at the Alhambra.

Before you come, check the elevation

If you take one idea away from this page, let it be this: before you book anything in Granada, look at how high it is. From our front door, the Mirador de San Nicolás and the Paseo de los Tristes are almost the same distance away —730 and 790 metres in a straight line— and between them there are 55 metres of height difference. That number, not the distance in metres, decides how many things fit into a day and whether it is worth bringing a wheeled suitcase or a rucksack.

The rest —which neighbourhood is prettier, which has the better tapas— is up for debate, and every local will tell you something different. The hill is not. You have the exact address of each flat on our apartment pages, and if you would rather ask, write to us: we will tell you plainly what you will find when you step out of the front door.