Day 6: Sittin’ in Sevilla

After a later start than usual on this Sunday morning, we packed up the car
and headed out of Córdoba to the outskirts to visit the ruins at Medina
Al-Zahra. We stopped for a quick breakfast at a casino (?!) where no one
spoke English and there was no written menu. Go Duncan the super
translator! Turns out that you could have tostada, tostada, or tostada
(yup, toast!) which was not really for me. Duncan managed to get me two
fried eggs (not quite as green today) and the others enjoyed the equivalent
of half a toasted baguette – Gilly’s with jam and the boys with crumbled
Iberian ham, crushed tomatoes and olive oil.

Thus fortified, we headed to the  Muslim settlement dating from the 10th
century that was the capital of Muslim Spain. The ruins were really
interesting and there were active archaeological worksites all around. But
it was hot!  We melted climbing through the  kitchen and governor’s rooms
and the like. So back to the air conditioned car for the 1.5 hour trip to
Sevilla accompanied by Spanish guitar music – from a CD of the trio that
played during our excellent dinner the first night in Córdoba.

The new Spanish highways proved a bit confusing for Sally, our fearless GPS
system and while she had no problem with the old streets, we kept losing
the signal in the little alleyways.  We eventually found the hotel (which
is right on one of the big plazas so it shouldn’t be *that* hard!) and were
confronted by our first disappointments.  While I have nothing but great luck with the website Booking.com especially with European hotels, this is the first time that things weren´t exactly what we wanted.  I booked a nonsmoking suite with a double and two twin beds.  We got a smoking suite with a king size bed and a sofa bed and the wireless isn´t working.  And the Sunday desk staff were not really up to scratch as far as making changes.  So we carefully assessed the smell of smoke in the room (none) and the size of the sofa bed (adequate) and decided that it would do for now.

Then off to see Seville.  We had lunch at a lovely taverna near the cathedral and all was going well until Duncan spilled his vino tinto all over my black skirt.  I managed to wring most of it out but I still smelled like a winery.  Nontheless, we decided to tackle the cathedral since it seemed appropriate to get some Jesus in on a Sunday even if we did smell funny.  It was really impressive, I must say if for no other reason than the fact that Christopher Columbus is buried there.  Pretty cool!  The main altar is way over the top for gold plating and there is an altar plata (silver altar) which defies the notion of polish.  In addition, there is the amazing Giralda tower attached to the cathedral – the bottom two-thirds were originally a minaret from a mosque built in the 13th century.  We´re really getting our Moorish exposure!  The cathedral brags that it is the largest Gothic cathedral in the world and I can believe it!  After more than an hour (and several hundred photgraphs), we went for the obligatory siesta.

After a short nap and showers, we ventured out again and wandered the city to find a good place for dinner.  Since we had such good luck with Trip Advisor in Cordoba, we thought we´d take their advice again and headed to the most highly rated restaurant in Sevilla.  Unfortunately, our luck didn´t hold out.  While we enjoyed the meal, it was nowhere near what we expected; we should have known we were in trouble when the told us the were out of albariño but said they would have a similar wine and tried to serve us gewurtstraminer!  Not the same thing at all thank you!

So we wandered through the gardens out side the Real Alcazar and went to another cafe for a last drink and desert.  Now I will tell an embarrassing tale on my spouse:  he had a major brain fart!  He had been doing so well with learning basic Spanish words but his mind must have just snapped because he accosted the closest waiter and blurted out ¨Sit?¨in a half command- half plaintiff cry.  This led to extensive peals of laughter and much joking for the rest of the evening.  Duncan enjoyed his first mojito in amoung snorts of laughter at his father´s expense but by the time we rolled into the hotel after midnight, all was forgiven (but not forgotten!)

Three things we noticed today:

1. TripAdvisor is not always right.  We could see where the restaurant we chose could have been wonderful but we were disappointed by the fact that it wasn´t for us.
2. The fans you see Spanish women carrying are not an affectation:  they help with the heat tremendously and I have now made my souvenier fan part of my daily wardrobe.
3. More English is spoken in the streets than Spanish.  This is the first city where there have been more people conversing in English (with a huge variety of accents) than in any other city we´ve visted so far.