Mark says “The cathedral in Seville, including La Giralda the bell tower, is the biggest in Europe however unlike all the other cathedrals we’ve visited so far was quite hot and stuffy inside. It contained the usual myriad of stucco religious portrayals and stained glass windows. Either we’re becoming a little immune to these, or they really weren’t that good, but the grave of Christopher Columbus was pretty cool.
On the main altar, there was a sculpture of Mary on top of which was a sphere of what appeared to American Indian feathers. On top of that was a royal crown – the whole thing was made out of silver, and I think it meant that the Spanish crown ruled the America’s and religion!
There was another enormous religious portrayal being the Retablo Mayor in which the cathedral’s patron saint, Maria de la Sede, sits at the high altar below a waterfall of gold. 44 gilded relief panels make up this portrayal and no photo we took will do it justice”.
It was another ridiculously hot day and so we stuck to every piece of shade we could find. We decided the Palace (Real Alcazar) would be nice and cool so we headed in there. This is another palace build atop a Moorish palace, and added to by a variety of Kings and Queens over time. The first royal residences here were built in 1364 by Pedro I, otherwise known as Peter the Great (or Peter the Awful if you were from the nobility). This turned out to be another fabulous example of Moorish/Spanish architecture that we just spent hours wandering through. The first part was the Patio of the Dolls (there were dolls heads carved into the inscriptions on the columns) which was a lovely little courtyard in the middle of all the bedrooms. The rest of the palace was filled with the magnificent archways that draw the eye through each of the rooms, with incredible carved domed ceilings. There was another courtyard with a pond and fountain and then a room filled with tapestries that depicted the discoveries of the New World. The tapestries were huge, around 3m x 5m and the room was devoted just to them – strangely enough, called ‘The Tapestries Room’.
We strolled through the gardens, saw peacocks, more fountains, prefect topiaries and some gorgeous gazebos. It was nice having a little time out there (and a smooch) while it was nice and cool and quiet. We were getting hungry though, and we always seem to get hungry around siesta time, so it can be a bit difficult trying to find food. We walked back out to the main square, felt sorry for all the horses standing on the hot pavement in the blazing sun (there were horse and cart rides everywhere). We found a restaurant and impressed the waitress with our Spanish – we have learnt “I would like” and so that just sounds so much better than ‘one Fanta and one beer please’. We had some great tapas (jamon y melon, and this melon was a strange cross between watermelon and kiwifruit) but then the good waitress left and we waited another 40 minutes for our next two tapas courses, which kind of took the shine off the food.
We left there and walked down to the river foreshore. Siesta time can be great as the streets become very quiet and relaxed – and the foreshore was no different in that regard. We picked up some information on the river cruise we wanted to do the next day and then had a look at the Torre del Oro. Built in 1220 as part of the walled defences, it was later used to store the gold that arrived from the New World. There used to be another tower on the other side of the river too, and they stretched a metal chain between them to stop hostile ships from sailing up the river (I thought that was really interesting).
We walked past the bull ring, and decided we’d drop in there after the river cruise and have a look around as well. But, we were buggered, and it was time to head back to the motel, eat, and crash out again!
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