I actually had very little idea of what a monumental city Seville/Sevilla was before we arrived. As explained earlier, it was largely due to prodding by our host in Cadiz that we were going there at all.
We were dropped off on the edge of the old city and spent a while in a long, tree lined plaza and a former brewpub (former because they'd recently moved all of their production to a much larger facility near Barcelona). The plaza was nice, with a fun busker who we sat and enjoyed listening to from a distance (he was surprised when Sarah came up behind him to offer some coins after he'd already hit up all the cafe bar patrons). And the limited selection of the brewery's own beer (helles and season) was good. But none of this made it super clear why Jose had insisted we must visit.
That afternoon we got a bit closer to the reasons, with a nice walk through the Macarena neighbourhood to the south of where we were staying (inevitably we saw young girls taking videos of themselves doing… the macarena in front of the signs at the northern gate to the area. Just inside the old city wallBasilica de Macarenas, the Basilica de Magdalena was a igbig deal, with hordes of visitors snapping away inside and choosing from an almost bewildering array of merchandise at the church gift shop next door.
We also got a fun look at, well if not precisely “modern” Sevilla, at least “living” Sevilla when we sat down for a while in Plaza de la Encarnacion underneath the Metropol Parasol, a huge awning that covers almost all of plaza. It reminded me a bit of the shades over the orchid garden in Medellin's botanical garden, and was probably at least as much sculpture as functional, as it allowed the rain straight through on to us when it began to drizzle.
After a quick sneak preview of the monumental city we joined the earliest of the Friday night crowd for a cana (250ml glass of beer) on the seats outsidr a little bar/tapareia that, at 20:30 was just beginning to warm up to the evening.
The next day was the one we devoted to Seville's history. And what a history! It's been the most important city in Andalusia for much of its history, whether under the Romans, moors, the Hapsburg monarchs and on into modern times as well.
The old Jewish quarter was full of charming narrow streets (now devoted virtually 100% to the tourist trade). Nearby, the gardens outside the Alcazar (Almohad palace, kind of Seville's answer to Granada's Alhambra) were lovely to stroll through, and spit us out in a plaza faced by the Archivos des las Indias. Inside are all of Spain's official records dealimg with the exploration, conquest, trade and governing of the Americas. These are, of course, an absolute treasure trove of history. And the building itself is pretty impressive as well. Inside we visited a cool exhibition about the movements of food in every direction between Spain, the Americas and the Philippines. All displayed in amongst the shelves and shelves of historic records
But the most prominent historical monument in Sevilla has to be the cathedral. It's one of the largest churches in the world (regularly referred to as “the largest in the world by volume,” which I find a little confusing, because it seems to me that if you were going to choose a single measure of what constitutes the largest church, volume would be it, so I don't quite get why the tourism authorities, when looking for superlatives to market it with didn't simply say “the largest church in the world”. Maybe just to avoid sleighting St. Peter's?
Anyhow, we admire the outside from every angle and hemmed and hawed over whether to devote some of our limited “major attraction” funds to paying the entry fee. I'm a fan of Gothic architecture, and we eventually concluded that the world's largest (Gothic) church probably deserved our funds and attention.
I ended up being very happy we decided to go inside, but not so much because of the architecture. Despite being completed in (only!) 100 years, and thus not having tastes change much during its construction, the cathedral is a bit of a mess architecturally. Despite the huge, gold-everywhere Altar Meyor, it still lacks any obvious focus, feeling like the primary goal of the original designers was “let's just make it big. Use every bit of land we have available, but a roof over it, add some current (Gothic at the time) flourishes and call it a day (or a century I guess).
No, the best things about the cathedral were its smaller touches. The sacristies and chapels set off the huge main hall were packed with enough art to rival most major museums. And the smaller spaces, while less grand, felt more thoughtfully designed. The climb up the 34 ramps of the bell tower (originally a minaret of the mosque that the cathedral was built on top of) was fun and gave great views out over the city. And of course there was the historical highlight of the place, the tomb of Christopher Columbus (and, less grand, but curiously more prominently located, that of his son as well).
Plaza España, south of the cathedral in the Maria Luisa gardens, was another highlight. It was originally constructed for the 1929 world's fair, and while its grandiosity is pretty impressive, I found the human bustle (e.g. Flamenco dancing buskers, fortune tellers and teenagers doing some weird mass dance to pop music) and the little details (e.g. the candy-striped balustrades, and the tiled bench-alcoves representing all thirty-odd provinces and independent cities of Spain) to be the best parts.
The area we were staying in was in the city's northan, and was clearly an immigrant neighbourhood. Our host was from Morocco. There were Dominican flags and restaurants all over, and it evoked strong memories of South America as well, with “Pollo Broaster” featured on signs up and down the streets. It was a fun counterpoint to the jam packed tourist areas further south.
As was our walk down to the train station to meet our ride north. While we did walk through some of the tourist centre, it was before 08:00 on a Sunday and the city was astonishingly quiet, with a bakery where we stopped to purchase some breakfast buns being pretty much the only business we saw open. Fortunately, our day was planned around mostly outdoor activities and admiring architecture, so this didn't prove to be a problem as we headed north.
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