Al Andalus Luxury train: Seville, Granada & Cordoba

Begin your trip with complimentary airport lounge access before flying into Seville, where you will make your way to your historic accommodation. Whether it’s Moorish defences, Roman ruins or Christianity’s exuberance, it seems as if all the world has left its mark on this thousand-year-old city of Seville. Its Gothic cathedral proudly exhibits an Islamic minaret as a bell tower and the Alcázar is a great Moorish castle that cloaks a beautiful royal residence. You’ll also visit the General Archive of the Indies, a 16th-century merchants’ exchange that documents the rich history of the Spanish Empire.

Stay: Corral del Rey, Seville (Deluxe)

Meet at the historic Hotel Alfonso XIII for a welcome lunch with a panoramic view of the city, followed by a visit to the Plaza de Espana. You’ll then board the luxurious Al Andalus to make the journey to Jerez. First built for members of the British monarchy to travel between Calais and the French Riviera, cabins recall all the grandeur of the Belle Époque, featuring plush fabric sofas, gilded wood panelling and even hydromassage showers. The lounge carriages are equally regal, host to dances, cocktail evenings and live performances along with gourmet dining and show cooking. A welcome drink on the train and presentation of the crew, before dinner on board while the train heads for Jerez and the first overnight stop.

After breakfast, join a coach for the short journey to Cadiz, popularly known as "la Tacita de Plata" (the Silver Teacup) and considered the oldest city in the West. You will have free time to immerse yourselves in Cadiz's charms at leisure, and after lunch return to Jerez in the afternoon for free time and dinner.

This morning you’ll be introduced to the region’s wealth of oenological delights, with a tasting visit to one of Jerez’s fabled wine (sherry) cellars. Your cultural education will continue will continue with a visit to the region’s famous equestrian ballet. Set to traditional music, it’s simply titled ‘How the Andalucian Horses Dance’. Lunch on board the train as it heads towards Ronda, where you will have dinner in a local restaurant.

While Cádiz dates back three millennia, Ronda can also count itself among Spain’s oldest cities, having been established in a relatively sprightly 9th century BC. As such, it owes much of its charm to its Moorish past, with its La Ciudad old town filled with Islamic mosques and palaces. To complete the picture, throw in legendary bullrings, pretty Spanish plazas, great fortress walls and delicate churches. And, like its older cousin, it enjoys a spectacular backdrop. Swapping sea for mountain peaks, it’s dramatically perched on a great inland plateau fissured into a 100m-deep gorge. This is the beauty that has won praise from the Romantic likes of Ernest Hemingway and Orson Welles. Lunch on board while the train returns to Moorish Andalucia with a tour of Córdoba. Once the capital of Islamic Spain, it laid claim to the title of Western Europe’s largest and most culturally rich city, here enjoy dinner and overnight on the train.

Cordoba is centred around the Mezquita. Ranking among the Islamic world’s finest architectural achievements, its silver-and-gold domes look down on thousands of marble columns and hundreds of chandeliers. But, as the region’s history goes, the Mezquita was to be converted into a 16th-century cathedral, adding grand Renaissance flourishes while retaining much of the building’s thousand-year-old charm. It’s a fitting metaphor for the rest of the city, with the likes of Moorish forts sitting alongside pretty 17th-century plazas and Renaissance palaces. Lunch on board the train before disembarking at Linares, you’ll board a coach to tour its pair of nearby Renaissance gems. You’ll start with Úbeda whose 16th-century rulers – ever the showmen – sought to improve their courtly esteem with the ever-favoured Italian aesthetic. The result? Great chapels with façades of Greek gods, a town hall that’s more palace than place of work and a hospital that’s furnished with marble columns and frescoed staircases. Next-door Baeza was also suitably enamoured with the Italian Renaissance, its 16th-century aristocracy keen not to be outshone, of course. Its Gothic cathedral, itself borne from a demolished mosque, was beautified with classical flourishes and a series of handsome palaces, plazas and delightful chapels were quickly added. After your tour you’ll continue on to Granada.

From their stronghold in Granada the Nasrid dynasty once ruled over much of Andalucia. It’s a 300-year-long power grab that is immortalised in the emirate’s Alhambra. A UNESCO-listed wonder, this palace-fort’s stern walls hide a royal interior that forms one of the greatest examples of Islamic architecture’s fineries. Delicate arches are carved into detailed motifs, fountains trickle lazily and the rooms of the royal quarters are honeycombed into intricate lattices. And it sits among a dizzying collection of gilded basilicas, 16th-century monasteries and Renaissance palaces. You’ll take it all in on your city tour.

After a last breakfast, if you have time spend your last hours exploring Granada before a transfer returns your to the airport for your flight back to the UK