Christmas in Andalucía, oranges on the trees and the mountains white

Andalucía in December offers one of the stranger sights in Europe. From the coast near Málaga, where the afternoons are often warm enough to sit outside in a jumper, you can look inland to see the peaks of the Sierra Nevada white with snow. In the streets of Seville and Córdoba, the bitter orange trees that line the pavements are loaded with fruit. Much of the crop of those sour Seville oranges goes to Britain for marmalade. It is winter, but a southern one, and for anyone used to a British December it feels like a reprieve.

How Spain does Christmas

The Spanish Christmas has a rhythm of its own, and it runs longer than the British one. On 22 December the whole country stops to listen to the Christmas lottery draw, El Gordo, the "fat one", sung out by schoolchildren on the radio. The main family meal is on Christmas Eve, Nochebuena, often followed by midnight mass, the Misa del Gallo. Christmas Day is quieter. The season runs on to 6 January, the Epiphany, when the Three Kings bring children their presents. On the evening of the 5th, towns hold processions, the cabalgatas, with floats from which sweets are thrown into the crowd.

Nativity scenes, belenes, are taken seriously, from tiny tableaux in churches to elaborate displays of whole villages in miniature. In Málaga, the main shopping street, Calle Larios, is famous for its Christmas lights, and the evening walk along it is something of a local tradition in itself.

The food of the season is part of it. Turrón, a nougat of almonds and honey, comes in hard and soft varieties and is eaten everywhere. Polvorones and mantecados, crumbly shortbreads made with lard, almonds and cinnamon, are an Andalusian speciality, and the town of Estepa, in the province of Seville, has made them for generations. At New Year, Spaniards eat twelve grapes at midnight, one for each stroke of the clock, which is harder than it sounds. Antequera, on the Travelsphere route, adds a different kind of age: its great dolmens, burial chambers roofed with enormous stone slabs, are older than the stone circle at Stonehenge.

The coast and the white villages

Just You's Christmas in Andalucía and Andalucía at Christmas, both seven nights for solo travellers, cover the same ground on the Costa del Sol and the hills behind it. They visit Málaga and the white villages of Mijas and Frigiliana, whose whitewashed houses climb steep hillsides above the sea. They also visit Nerja, with its clifftop promenade, the Balcón de Europa, and Ronda.

Ronda is one of the most dramatic towns in Spain. It stands on a plateau split in two by a deep gorge, El Tajo, crossed by an eighteenth-century stone bridge that seems to grow out of the rock. Its bullring is one of the oldest in the country, and the views from the edge of the cliff across the countryside are remarkable at any time of year, and especially clear in winter.

Málaga itself repays a day. Picasso was born there in 1881, and the city now has a museum of his work in a Renaissance palace in the old town. Above it, the Moorish fortress of the Alcazaba climbs the hill beside a Roman theatre, and from the castle of Gibralfaro at the top the view takes in the port, the bullring and, on a clear winter day, the mountains behind.

The great cities

Travelsphere's A Week in Andalucía at Christmas, seven nights, takes in the great historic cities of the region. In Granada, the Alhambra, the palace-fortress of the Nasrid sultans, stands with the snow of the Sierra Nevada behind it. Córdoba has the Mezquita, a vast mosque of striped arches with a cathedral built inside it. In Seville, the Gothic cathedral, among the largest in the world, holds the tomb of Columbus, and the Alcázar is a royal palace still in use. The trip also visits Antequera, with its prehistoric dolmens, and Ronda.

Winter is a good season for these cities. In summer, Córdoba and Seville are among the hottest places in Europe, and walking about in the afternoon is a trial. In December the days are mild and bright, the queues are shorter, and the evenings are cold enough for a bowl of soup and a glass of something warming. Pack a coat for the evenings and the mountains, sunglasses for the day, and leave room for oranges.