A Game Old Dame

Seville is a city of plazas….small squares full of orange trees with the bitter Seville oranges falling to the ground all over. No good picking them in a desperate search for vitamin  C in this land shy of vegetables. They are too bitter.

I climbed the old Moslem minaret which is now the bell tower to the Seville Cathedral.  Vistas of whites buildings with the bull ring built in the 1700s showing through. The Islamic influence is not so obvious here.

The busy baroque Cathedral proudly displays a certificate from the Guinness Record people saying it is the biggest in the world; it might reluctantly admit that St Peter’s and St. Paul’s are grander if the ceiling heights are included in scale. The Della Robbia’s are an elegant respite in so much gilt.

Gilt Gilt everywhere gilt!! This lot is in the Cathedral

Ah! Catholic Spain! It might be fading but it still has some class acts. In the nearby OTT baroque church you get into for the same ticket, a bone of St Barbara is on display and yet another fragment of the true Cross. That was a bloody big Cross He had to bear given the number of fragments in existence.

A vibrant town

African photograpers on display!!

Seville is deceptively fascinating. There’s the art show in the street, the buskers, the tram running past the Cathedral with the gentry spilling in front of it waiting to go to a formal wedding, the estates with their skaters’ ramps down by the river, street art and a bustling city centre. There’s even a man feeding pigeons in the park where the executions were held during the Inquisition.

Finally a genuine local tapas bar…Morales…huge pottery wine barrels, a local clientele, dry white and anchovies on fresh cheese worth the trip to Seville. Even better, a thunderstorm breaks the heat and my sinus seems to improve.  We’re checking the pedometer, about 17000 steps today albeit slowly in the heat. A tick for the heart foundation.

Even a rollerskating gnome has to rest

Carmen came from here so what is more natural than a re-enactment in the park?

Cordoba…full of tourist tapas but the big number is the Mesquita where Catholic Spain popped its Cathedral bang in the middle of the 8th plus Century grand mosque. A wonderous building. Row after row of serene double arched colonnades with the Gothic church dropped in the middle. “Cop that you heathens; we’re in charge”.

Row upon row of arches

It’s 9.30 and the priests are gathering…twenty of them…dressed in purple and red. …. great male theatre. So what does a recovering Catholic who hasn’t believed for 40 years do? Go to Mass of course. Male theatre at its best with wonderful music thrown in. But, goddess, please note, I am still in the recovering mode. I wouldn’t dream of taking communion.

Tourists trail around the remains of the great mosque peering over the red cord, wondering what they are missing but hey, I am on the inside today.

The Mesquita from outside the town. The dome of the inserted church can be seen

Ticked off the other must sees in the town but best of all were the gardens and courtyards. Bursts of red and purple in cool green corners behind whitewashed corridors of houses and imposing palaces.

The gardens of the Alcazar

It is good that Cordoba has won the Spanish nomination for the next European City of Culture . There are obviously a number of street artists in hiding outise the walls of the old town.

Downsides

Tapas wearing thin but wary of the salads…they’re off the menu in Europe today because of the mystery deaths in Germany. Spanish cucumbers were under suspicion. I sometimes worry about new forms of germ warfare that future societies might unleash on each other or about strange viruses that might seep through the world. But I don’t think about it often. There are too many wonderful things to wonder at.

People at play

Outside the walls of the old town, there are senior citizens’ playgrounds where the elders take their exercise and from our brief moments there, a number of them did!

Talk. Cycle. Observe.

Inside the walls, the tourists take lots of breaks from the early summer heat.

The tourists rest in a row

Seville

My cold is worse but we hit Seville on Saturday. Seen the palace so far…oh, how intent I am on educating myself with all this history. Right now I ‘ve had to order a marguerita to get over all this learning. More tapas soon.

It was so bloody hot today that at 5 we took to a river cruise. Columbus left the same way a few hundred years ago….same river, same place. Magellan even earlier. Sad, sad , sad, a middle aged Japanese man in a wheelchair pushed by a wisp of a woman. He’s had a stroke but is groomed to a fault and seemingly used to being in charge. She dozes on the boat.. as the Japanese can……exhausted. He nearly falls from his chair, impotent. What is the backstory? Someone says they are with a German speaking group. How lucky I am!!!

One of my traveling companions is not reticent about her strongly held opinions that are mostly diametrically opposed to my own strongly held opinions. What a  learning experience for me to keep calm and go to bed early so I don’t let go with my once cutting tongue. Perhaps I am growing up or growing kinder or just too tired to engage.

Anyway…tomorrow the Cathedral  (after more average tapas).