The Ham Nomads

4 Feb 2015. <ES> Sevilla, Andalucia —

Today we went back into Seville, and started the day with a nice cup of coffee at the Starbucks near the Cathedral. They gave us a discount voucher for tomorrow, so we might take advantage of it!

Then we visited the Cathedral, one of the showpieces of Sevilla! This is the world's largest Gothic cathedral, and the third largest Church in all of Christendom! According to the story, the builders said "Hagamos una Iglesia tan hermosa y tan grandiosa que los que la vieren labrada nos tengan por locos" ("Let us build a church so beautiful and so grand that those who see it finished will think we are mad"). It's built on the site of, and has the square footprint of, the earlier Muslim mosque. Moreover, the minaret of that mosque, the Giralda, was so venerated by the Moors that they wanted to destroy it before the Christian conquest of the city in 1248. King Alfonso X prevented this, declaring that "were they to remove a single stone, they would all be put to the sword". So the Giralda was preserved to become the belltower of the cathedral!

The Sacristy is amazing!

Another of the cathedral's claims to fame is that it contains the tomb of Christopher Columbus — that is, if the counter-claim by the Dominican Republic is discounted. The bones have been moved at least four times, so there is room for doubt, but since Seville has offered to allow DNA testing of "their" remains, and the Dominican Republic has refused to disturb "theirs", we tend to believe Seville's claim!

We climbed to the top of La Giralda for a wonderful view of the city. There are no stairs, but 35 ramps — this was so the muezzin didn't have to climb the tower five times per day to call the adhan, but instead could ride his horse to the top! La Giralda, built between 1184 and 1196, is the finest of only three Almohad period minarets still in existence, the other two being in Morocco. It was originally topped by four copper spheres, one atop the other, but three of these were toppled in the earthquake of 1356. The tower is now topped by a Christian Renaissance structure. In fact, over time, it has had three different top structures — up to 1356, from then until 1568, and from then on. There is also a 24-bell carillion installed in the tower, one of the largest peals of bells in any belfry! Each bell is named for one of the churches in Seville.

From the Catedrale, we dropped into a kebab shop for lunch, and then we walked across to the Plaza de Toros, the bullring of the Real Maestranza. This is open to the public, as it has an associated museum, but only to guided tours.

The Matador's prayer,
from the wall in
Matadors' chapel

We thought it would be worth doing this, so we indulged ourselves with a Spanish-English tour (everything first explained in Spanish, then in English). The Seville bullring is considered the home of bullfighting in Spain — and it's another place (after the Tobacco Factory) where we interact with Bizet's Carmen — it is here that Don José kills Carmen at the end of the opera. We found out more than we really wanted to about bullfighting — apparently, six bulls are killed at each bullfight in Seville, two for each of three matadors. There is a special door for the matadors to exit by, but only if they have been awarded two trophies during the bullfight, assessed by the president of the bullring on their performance, and which can be one or two ears from the bull, the tail and the hoof.

After this, we walked back along the river, past the Torre del Oro to our bus stop to Puerto Gelves. The Torre del Oro has a history of its own — it was built in the thirteenth century, and the name may refer to the metallic gleam of the tiles that used to cover it, or it could refer to its function as a deposit for the precious metals brought back from the Americas.

While we were waiting for our bus, we chuckled at a group walking past, taking selfies! So, at the end of the day, we caught our bus back to Puerto Gelves for the night.

Distance driven — today, nil; to date, 12,390 miles ( 19,940 km )