Our apartment in Seville sits in a quiet corner literally adjacent to the western-most wall of the Real Alcazar (i.e, Royal Palace). Seriously, when we visited the Alcazar and were in a sort of isolated part overlooking what I believe is called the Poet’s Corner, we looked down and saw the front door of our apartment maybe 50 feet away. The apartment is also within probably 300 steps of the Seville Cathedral. So … if you’re considering Seville as a travel destination (highly recommended) and you’re looking to stay somewhere that is dead perfect, contact Alejandra here.
Anyway, after arriving via train (2 ½ easy hours from Madrid) on Sunday afternoon, we visited the Seville Cathedral and the Church of the Savior. The cathedral is the third-largest in Europe behind St. Peter’s and St. Paul’s. Since it actually has the largest footprint of any cathedral, I’m not sure what “third-largest” covers. Volume? Height? Weight? Anyway, it’s big. The cathedral was begun in 1401 and finished in 1528. It has an 80-foot altarpiece (aka wall of gold), the tomb of Christopher Columbus, and was home – infamously – to the first (forced) public confession and punishment for heresy during the Inquisition.
The Church of the Savior is a couple blocks north of the Seville Cathedral. It has many of the statues that people parade through town on floats during Holy Week, which is a Very Big Thing. If you want more info, either Google “Semana Santa” or visit Laura’s blog on that topic here. Most importantly, en route to the Church of the Savior, Paige found her favorite thing about Spain. If you know Paige, you know that she is fond of order and symmetry. She particularly likes topiaries and uniform hedges. Yes, almost as much as she likes power-washing. As it turns out, Seville is a complete triumph where all of these things are concerned, as it seems like they wash the streets every night.
We started Day 2 with a long walk through the Triana neighborhood. Triana is on the other side of the river from Seville proper and used to be viewed as the wrong side of the tracks (bridge). Now, it’s just a more colorful part of town. Less touristy. More “real.” And home of possibly the best tiny patisserie on the planet – Dulceria Manu Jara. We then looped back around and spent some time meandering through Seville University and the surrounding area. The classrooms – one of which is pictured below – are slightly different from ours at KU. While Paige and Hollis joined the locals in the typical Siesta, I put in a full afternoon of completely random wandering. This time, the wandering included stumbling upon a terrific hole-in-the-wall men’s shop. The name of the shop is Cabello Sastreria and it’s on the order of Drake’s of London. So if you’re into that sort of thing and you have plans to come here, you’re welcome.
In the evening, we went to the Flamenco show (one of the billions available) that was recommended by the woman who owns our apartment. I appreciate and support Flamenco primarily for the reason that I appreciate and support bullfighting: tradition. More than anything, the performance drove home two points. First, I could never play the Flamenco style of guitar. Second, the only thing that would be more annoying than having a kid who is a drummer (mercifully, Hollis never practices) would be having a kid who is an aspiring Flamenco dancer. After the show, we had dinner at our apartment owner’s dad’s Mexican restaurant, La Cantina Mexicana. It was the best meal we’ve had in Spain.
On Day 3, we started with a visit to the Royal Alcazar. The Alcazar has been used by Spain’s rulers – including the Moors that ran things until the Catholics managed to conquer them – for over a thousand years. Instead of waiting in line for who knows how long, we had skip-the-queue tickets that also granted us semi-private access (15 people per 30 minutes) to 20 or so rooms that are still used by the current monarchs. As Paige told Hollis, nobody – and I do mean nobody – does advance vacation planning better than I do. The Alcazar was rebuilt in the 14th century after the Catholics took over, but a lot of the original Islamic design was kept intact. In places it looks like the kings throughout the years basically didn’t want to deal with redecorating and said, “fine, we’ll leave the floors and wall tiles and ceilings alone and make up for it by just hanging a bunch of European art and tapestries.” While the palace is interesting, the gardens are terrific … and, making The Boss happy, neatly manicured.
After lunch, I made a solo trip to the Museum of Belle Artes. This small museum primarily features 16th century religious art and satisfies my main criterion for making a museum truly enjoyable – basically no one was there. Then I did a few more miles of wandering in areas north of the primary tourist district before swinging back through the old Jewish quarter (Barrio Santa Cruz) again. The Jewish quarter typically is my favorite part of European cities and Seville’s is no exception. I find the random shops, incredibly tight quarters, and labyrinthian streets fascinating. I suspect the thousands of Sevillian Jews that were executed here both before and during the Inquisition and then the thousands more that subsequently were forced to live here would view the quaintness through an entirely different lens.
After a second run at paella for dinner (at a place that I can't really recommend), we ambled over to the Plaza de Espana, walked around quite a bit more, and finished -- as usual -- with ice cream. Although I'm walking at least 10-12 miles a day on this trip, the scales are going to have a field day when I get back.
Next stop(s) … Rondo, Granada, and Toledo.
Cheers,
Mike
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