Spain Archives - Pacific Northwest Explorer

Granada and the Alhambra

by Alan K. Lee

Albayzin neighborhood seen from the Alhambra

Introduction

The main reason, and to be honest probably the only reason, that my wife and I visited Granada on our trip to Spain last spring was to tour the Alhambra. The Alhambra is simply magnificent, and almost reason enough by itself to justify the 12,000-mile roundtrip journey that we took. But if we were to do the trip again, I would spend another day or two in Granada because I think we missed a lot by only spending one night there.

History

Like most of Andalusia, Granada has a long and complicated history. The oldest ruins unearthed in the city date to about 650 BCE. In 44 BCE the area became part of the Roman Empire. After the fall of Rome, the Visigoths ruled the area until the Moorish conquest in the 8^th century CE. At that time, Granada was a small community with a mostly Jewish population. As late as the 11^th century, Granada was a Shephardic Jewish state. Later, it was ruled by Berbers from North Africa. From 1232 until 1492 it was ruled by the Nasrid Dynasty. And Granada was the last city to be conquered by Christian forces during the Reconquista, surviving as a Muslim state for more than two centuries after the fall of Cordoba and Seville.

The Alhambra

The Alhambra was built during the Nasrid Dynasty. Construction of the complex began in 1238, two years after nearby Cordoba fell to Christian forces during the Reconquista, and was expanded over the course of more than a century.

Located on Sabika Hill, the Alhambra is a sprawling collection of fortifications and palaces. It was a self-contained community separate from the city of Granada during Nasrid rule, with its own water system that brought water from the mountains to the east rather than having to bring water up from the Darro River in the city below.

As it exists today, the Alhambra is a complicated combination of original construction by the Nasrids, additions made during the Renaissance (most notably the Palace of Charles V) and restorations done during the 19^th and early 20^th century. But it all seems to be of a piece, even if it is not.

We arrived in Granada on a Saturday morning after a short train ride from Cordoba. We didn’t have much time to explore the city before our walking tour of the Alhambra that afternoon.

I hadn’t done much research on Granada or the Alhambra. Sometimes it’s better to arrive without any preconceived notions of what you’re about to see, but I probably should have been better prepared. I didn’t realize how spread out and how big the Alhambra is, how much of a climb it is up from the city, and how long our walking tour would last.

There are a variety of ticket packages available. Advance tickets can be purchased online through the Alhambra y Generalife website. None are particularly expensive – the Alhambra General ticket that includes access to the full complex, including the Generalife (summer palace) is €19 per person – but admission to the Alhambra is limited to 8000 tickets per day and the various tour companies snatch up a large percentage of them as soon as they become available. When I looked into purchasing tickets online, several months in advance of our planned visit in early May, tickets were sold out for the two dates we had available. But I was able to book tickets through one of the tour companies.

Sierra Nevada Mountains viewed from the Alhambra

Our walking tour lasted more than three hours and was about six kilometers (3.7 miles) of walking, much of it uphill. I was pretty tired by the end of it, but what an incredible place! If I were to someday run out of new places to explore (doubtful), the Alhambra would be one of the first places I would revisit.

Walking tours of the Alhambra are available through a number of tour companies. We booked our tour through Play Granada. Our tickets cost US$66 for the two of us, significantly more than individual tickets, but it was money well spent. Our guide had a wealth of information that no guidebook could possibly match, and the skip-the-line tickets meant we did not have to waste time standing in any lines. Play Granada also offers walking, electric bike, and Segway tours of Granada (the Alhambra not included).

Granada Cathedral

The Granada Cathedral is prominent in the view of the city that you get from the Alhambra. Construction of the cathedral (officially the Metropolitan Cathedral-Basilica of the Incarnation) began in 1518 on the site of what had been the city’s principal mosque. Construction continued until the cathedral’s completion near the end of the 17^th century.

We didn’t go inside (it was Sunday morning and religious services were being held), but we did wander around for a while and admired the exterior of the cathedral the nearby plazas.

The cathedral is open 10:00-5:45 Mon-Sat and 3:00-5:45 on Sunday. Timed entry (morning or afternoon) tickets are available for €7 per person on the cathedral website.

Other Things to See and Do

If we had another day or two to explore the city, we would have visited the Albayzin (or Albaicin) neighborhood, the old Moorish Quarter located on a hill just north of the Alhambra, toured the interior of the cathedral, maybe taken an e-bike tour of the city, and probably done a more targeted search for great dining experiences (maybe a tapas tour). We’d probably also have done more of what we usually do in a new city, just wander around for a time with no set itinerary and see what we find.

Conclusion

Even the limited time we had to spend in Granada was a wonderful and truly memorable experience. Any trip to Andalusia should feature Granada and the truly magnificent Alhambra.

For more on our visit to Andalusia, check out my posts on Seville and Cordoba. And look for a future post on Ronda, Spain. You might also like my posts on Lisbon, Sintra, and the Algarve.

Posted November 16, 2024

All photos © Alan K. Lee

Cordoba, Spain

by Alan K. Lee

Introduction

When I was planning for the trip to Spain and Portugal that my wife and I took last spring (2024), Seville got a lot of my attention, as did Granada, Ronda, and Malaga, all for different reasons. Seville is the largest city in Andalusia, with a myriad of reasons to visit. Granada has the magnificent Alhambra. Ronda first got my attention more than a decade ago when I saw a TV travel program about the city. And Malaga is on the Mediterranean coast and has an international airport with many flights to the U.S. But Córdoba wasn’t much on my radar.

I included Córdoba in our itinerary mostly because it’s centrally located, and I couldn’t see a reason to completely bypass it. And I’m glad we didn’t, because Córdoba has a couple of gems that no one visiting Andalusia should miss, the city’s wonderful cathedral (the Mezquita) and the Alcazar de los Reyes Cristianos (Palace of the Christian Kings).

A Brief History of Córdoba

Córdoba has a long and diverse history. It was first established as a Carthaginian settlement, before being conquered by the Romans in 206 BC. Roman rule of the area lasted more than 600 years. After the fall of the Roman Empire, Córdoba became part of the Byzantine Empire, then was conquered first by the Visigoths and later, early in the 8^th century, by the Moors. Córdoba thrived under Muslim rule, becoming the second largest city in Europe by the 10^th century. In 1236, Ferdinand III drove the Moors out in the Reconquista that brought all of the Iberian Peninsula under Christian rule. Today, little of the Roman city of Corduba remains, but Córdoba retains much of the architectural heritage of the Moors, most notably the Mezquita (meth-KEY-ta) and the Alcazar.

Climate

The climate of Córdoba is notable for its hot and dry summers. It is the hottest city in Europe, with the average high temperature in July and August a scorching 99⁰F (37⁰C). Spring and fall are more moderate and are the best times to visit. Winters are mild with mid-winter highs around 60⁰F (15-16⁰C) and lows around 40⁰F (4-5⁰C). Annual rainfall averages about 22 inches, with 2-4” per month from October to April. We were there in early May and the weather was nearly perfect.

Our Visit

We traveled from Seville to Córdoba by train, only a 45-minute ride on Renfe’s high speed AVE trains. From the train station, we strapped on our backpacks and walked the mile or so to our hotel. I had some concerns about the hotel (La Despensa de la Corredera Hostal), which my wife had booked, but it turned out to be nothing like I associate with a hostel. It was modern, clean, comfortable, and had a private, ensuite bathroom. And it was located at the historic Plaza de la Corredera.

We spent our first afternoon and evening in Córdoba just wandering around, exploring the city, with no set agenda, something we often do when visiting a city for the first time. We walked along the riverfront, stopped at a sidewalk café for a beer, and walked around the exterior of the Mezquita and its Courtyard of the Oranges, which dates to the Moorish occupation, before returning to the Plaza de la Corredera, where we had dinner at one of the many restaurants there. The Plaza caters to tourists, and the food you get in restaurants in such areas is often expensive and mediocre at best, but our dinners were both good and reasonably priced.

The Mezquita

The Mezquita was constructed in 756 as the Great Mosque, possibly on the site of a Catholic Basilica built by the Visigoths. The mosque was expanded several times over the next two centuries, including construction of the minaret in 958. After the Reconquista, the Mezquita was converted to a Christian cathedral, but the name was retained. (Mezquita is Spanish for mosque, and today’s cathedral is also called the Mezquita-Catedral de Córdoba, or Mosque-Cathedral of Córdoba).

The Mezquita was modified a number of times after the Reconquista, most notably in the 16^th and early 17^th centuries when the central nave and transept of the Capilla Mayor, which rises in the center of the structure, were built. The minaret was also rebuilt into a Renaissance-style bell tower.

The Mezquita is an attractive structure, but the exterior does not make a grand statement. It’s neither tall nor particularly interesting from an architectural perspective. But the expansive interior, with hundreds of the original mosque’s two-tiered arches supporting the roof, the 13^th century Royal Chapel, the 15^th century Gothic-style nave of the Villaviciosa Chapel, and the Capilla Mayor are all stunning and make for a truly unique structure that blends many architectural styles into a magnificent whole.

General admission tickets to the Mezquita cost 13€, discounts are available to seniors, children, students, large groups, and the disabled, and children under 10 get in free. Tickets are available online from the Mezquita-Catedral Córdoba website or can be purchased at vending machines in the Courtyard of the Oranges on the north side of the cathedral. Entry is free from 8:30 to 9:30 in the morning, Monday through Saturday. Night tours are available for 20€ and entrance to the bell tower is 3€.

The Mezquita was named a UNESCO world heritage site in 1984, and that designation was expanded to the entire historic city center in 1994.

The Alcazar de los Reyes Cristianos

The site of the Alcazar was the Governor’s Residence during Roman rule and later a Visigoth fortress before Córdoba was conquered by the Moors. The original Alcazar was built by the Moors as the official residence and seat of power of Al-Andalus. After the Reconquista, King Alfonso XI of Castile began construction of the present-day Alcazar, which appears Moorish in style but in fact incorporates little of the original structure. There are four towers, one at each corner of the palace, and several large, enclosed courtyards, as well as two main halls, the Hall of Mosaics, and the Reception Hall. Like the Mezquita, the Alcazar is a UNESCO World Heritage Site

We did not initially plan to tour the Alcazar (largely because Rick Steves panned it), but we did want to see the surrounding gardens. We found that entry to the gardens is only through the Alcazar, though, so we stood in line (in the sun) for 15 or 20 minutes to get tickets, then in another line for half an hour to get into the palace. Then we had to wait another 30 minutes to get into the towers. But the Alcazar is interesting enough (though no match for the Real Alcazar in Seville) that it was worth the long waits to see it all.

General admission is 4.91€ (as of October 2024), with a 2.25€ discount for family groups (the official website says “large family members”) and students. Admission is free for Córdoba residents, children under 14, seniors (65+), and the disabled.

You enter the Alcazar through the Courtyard of the Women (Patio de las Mujeres), which gets its name from the fact that this was once the site of a women’s prison. The courtyard is an archaeological site with ruins of the original Alcazar and the remains of part of the Roman structure that predated it.

The four towers give views of the Mezquita to the northeast and the Alcazar Gardens (Jardines del Alcazar) adjacent to the southwest. The Courtyard of the Moriscos (Patio Morisco) is a tree filled rectangular courtyard with small ponds on each end and a central fountain.

While the palace was worth the wait, we spent more time in the gardens than in the palace itself. There have been gardens here since at least the 10^th century, but the present gardens are much more recent.

There are a number of ponds, fountains, and statues scattered throughout the 14-acre gardens. The gardens are dotted with palms and lemon, orange, and cypress trees. There are acres of shrubs and flowering plants. And there are plenty of shaded places to get out of the sun and sit for a while.

Other Attractions

One of the things Córdoba is noted for is its many private and public courtyards, called patios. Many of the residences in Córdoba are built around a central courtyard. Often there is a fountain in the center and the courtyards are often full of colorful flowering plants.

Each May, during the Córdoba Patios Festival, many of the patios are opened to the public for free viewing and competitions are held for traditional courtyard designs (1970s and earlier) and for more modern designs. Some of the patios are open year-round (except July and August) for a small entry fee. The Patios Festival has been designated an Intangible Cultural Heritage event by UNESCO.

There are also streets and alleys throughout the city that feature colorful flower displays, the Calleja de las Flores, near the Mezquita, being probably the best known.

Another feature of the city is the Guadalquivir River and the 2100-year-old Puente Romano (Roman Bridge). Just downstream of the bridge are the ruins of a number of ancient mills. Across the pedestrian only bridge, the Torre de la Calahorra, a medieval gate-tower, has a small museum, and there are walking paths on both sides of the river.

Conclusion

I have no doubt that there are many other sights worth seeing and things worth doing in Córdoba that my wife and I didn’t discover or just didn’t have time to experience during our stay. Seville and Granada may get the spotlight when it comes to tourist destinations in the Andalusia region of Spain, but visitors should not overlook Córdoba. It’s a beautiful, charming, and historic city. I am more than happy that we included it on our itinerary and if you’re planning a trip to Andalusia, you should definitely plan to spend a day or two in Córdoba. I don’t think you will regret it.

Posted October 15, 2024

All photos © Alan K. Lee

Seville, Spain

by Alan K. Lee

Introduction

Seville, like most European cities, has a long, varied, and very interesting history. It also has a lively and vibrant modern culture. But you can’t begin to describe Seville in a few sentences, there’s just too much to it. You can’t grasp Seville by reading about it. You have to experience it in person to really take it in. And we could only scratch the surface in the short three days that my wife and I had on our recent trip to Portugal and Andalusia. But it was a great three days.

So, if you’re planning a visit, doing your homework is essential. There is so much to see and do in Seville that you can’t do it all, unless you are staying for an extended time. Pick the places to see and things to do that interest you the most. Figure out how much time you need to see or do each and plan accordingly. But also try to leave some time to just wander the streets and see what you find. My wife and I have had many memorable unplanned experiences in our travels by doing just that.

You’ll find that a few things come up over and over in articles about Seville. If you’re a foodie, you’ll want to do a tapas tour. If you’re a fan of dance (or just curious), you’ll want to take in a flamenco performance. If you want to get into the depths of Seville’s culture, you might want to schedule your visit to be able to take in a bullfight, or maybe just visit the Plaza de Toros and its museum. You probably won’t find much emphasis on bullfighting in the guidebooks, but it is (or at least was) a big part of Andalucian culture. We did none of those things, though.

18th century public fountain, central Seville

What we did do was tour the Seville Cathedral and climb the Giralda bell tower, tour the Real Alcazar palace and gardens, and visit the Triana district, the Plaza de España, and the Alameda de Hercules. We also took in the Setas de Sevilla (aka The Mushrooms), the large wooden sculptural canopy that is utterly unique to Seville. And we spent some time just wandering through the old center of the city, as we usually do when visiting European cities.

Seville Cathedral and La Giralda Tower

The first cathedral in Seville was originally a mosque (built between the years 1172 and 1189 during the Moorish occupation of the Iberian Peninsula). When Ferdinand III conquered Seville and brought it back under Christian rule in 1248, the mosque was converted into a Christian cathedral. The present-day Seville Cathedral was built in the 15^th century (on the same site) to replace the converted mosque. Many additions, expansions, and repairs were made over the centuries, extending into the early 20^th century.

The interior of the cathedral is huge. It’s Spain’s largest and tallest cathedral, the third largest church in the world, and the largest gothic structure in the world. Inside, there’s a vast array of paintings, sculptures, and displays. The cathedral website says you should allow 75 minutes to tour the cathedral, but you could easily spend hours. It may not be the most beautiful or most impressive cathedral in Europe, but it’s certainly worth a visit.

Although tickets can be purchased at the cathedral, purchasing online in advance is recommended to avoid the often-long lines at the ticket office. Tickets can be purchased up to seven weeks in advance on the official Seville Cathedral website. Online general admission adult tickets are currently (2024) €12.00 per person. Admission for seniors (65+) and students (13-25) is €6.00. Admission is free for children under 13. Guided tours are available for €20.00 and tours last about 90 minutes. An audio guide is available for €5.00. On site ticket prices are €1.00 more than online prices. Tickets include entry to the Giralda bell tower.

Even with advanced purchase, entry lines can be long, especially at the main entrance on the west side of the cathedral. With tickets in hand, you can also enter through the Court of the Orange Trees (which dates to the Moorish occupation) on the north side, which had a much shorter line. The entrance to the courtyard is adjacent to the Giralda bell tower on the east side of the cathedral.

The 322-foot tall La Giralda bell tower pre-dates the cathedral. The lower portion dates to Roman times. The middle section was added by the Moors and became the mosque’s minaret. The present top section of the tower was added in the 16^th century to replace the original top section, which collapsed in 1356.

Courtyard of the Orange Trees viewed from La Giralda bell tower

The climb to the top of the tower was crowded and slow, and the viewing area was elbow-to-elbow. The views of the city and cathedral exterior are magnificent, but viewing was hampered by the crowd and the fact that the view is through wire mesh covered openings. Smart phone camera lenses are small enough to take unobstructed photos through the mesh openings, though, and there are openings that can be accessed on your way up or down that are less crowded (but with views that aren’t quite as expansive as from the top of the tower).

The Real Alcazar

The Real Alcazar (or Royal Palace) is located just south of the Cathedral. The original palace complex was built by the Moors but little of the original alcazar remains, beyond the name (alcazar is an Arabic word meaning castle or palace). Much of what you see today was constructed in the 13^th and 14^th centuries.

The Real Alcazar consists of a series of interconnected buildings and courtyards (called patios). You enter through the Puerta de Leon (Lion’s Gate) on the northwest corner of the complex. The combination of buildings and patios is even larger in area than the Seville Cathedral. Add in the adjacent gardens and you have a truly huge complex. I think you could easily spend half a day exploring it all.

For my money, the Real Alcazar is more impressive and more beautiful than the Seville Cathedral. The interior and some of the exterior is adorned with incredibly intricate, colorful, and stunningly beautiful tile work. Room after room of it. And in one of the palace’s rooms, you’ll find six huge, amazingly detailed tapestries that are truly impressive. We spent more time (about two hours) in the Real Alcazar than we did in the Seville Cathedral and that doesn’t include the time we spent exploring the palace gardens.

The realalcazarsevilla.com website describes the gardens as “one of the most beautiful and special gardens in the world.” I’m not sure I’d go that far, but they are beautiful, and we spent a good amount of time wandering through them after our tour of the interior.

General admission tickets to the Real Alcazar cost €13.50 for adults and €6.00 for seniors (65+) and students (14-30). Admission is free for children (13 and under) and the disabled. Admission is free for all on Monday evenings (6-7 pm spring and summer, 5-6 pm fall and winter). As with tickets to the cathedral, buying in advance online (go to alcazarsevilla.org) is recommended.

The Plaza de España

The Plaza de España was constructed for the 1929 Ibero-American Exposition, which was held to make symbolic peace with Spain’s former American colonies. The semi-circular plaza is ringed by architecturally impressive buildings, most of which now hold government offices. A wide canal separates the plaza from the buildings. There are towers at each end of the ring of buildings and a large fountain in the center of the plaza. Admission is free.

The plaza is beautiful at any time of the day (we were there in the afternoon), but it might be at its most stunning after sunset when the plaza, the fountain, and the surrounding structures are all lit up. And you might even be able to catch a free flamenco performance in the plaza. We didn’t explore the adjacent Maria Luisa Park, but from the photos I’ve seen, the park clearly rivals the beauty of the gardens at the Real Alcazar.

The Triana District

Separated from the main downtown area of Seville by the Canal de Alfonso XIII, Triana is a charming neighborhood of shops, cafes, bars, and historic buildings. If you walk across the Triana Bridge (the Puente de Triana, aka the Puente de Isabel II) from downtown Seville, you first come to the Capilla del Carmen and then the remains of the Castle of San Jorge, which was the headquarters of the Spanish Inquisition in Seville. The Triana Market (Mercado de Triana), to the north of the bridge, sits within the footprint of the ruined castle. The market is filled with fruit and vegetable stands and small cafes and bars, and it’s a great people watching spot. To the west of the Triana Market, there is a small museum (the Museo de la Ceramica de Triana) dedicated to the tile and pottery shops that Triana was once known for, a few of which are still in operation.

The Calle de San Jacinto is a pedestrian only street leading away from the bridge into the heart of Triana that is lined with cafes and shops, and there is a pedestrian walkway along the shore of the canal that offers views of the Seville Cathedral, the Plaza del Toros, and the Tower of Gold (Torre del Oro). All in all, the Triana district is just an enjoyable and scenic locale that is well worth exploring.

The Alameda de Hercules

The Alameda de Hercules is a long rectangular tree-filled plaza in the northern part of the historic center of Seville. Many cafes and restaurants front the plaza. There is a children’s playground, many shaded benches, and the plaza is bookended by tall columns. The columns at the southern end are topped by statues of Hercules and Julius Caesar. The slightly shorter columns at the north end are topped with stylized lions. The Alameda is known for its vibrant nightlife and the area’s gay friendly neighborhoods. There is a monument in the plaza to the victims of AIDS.

The Mushrooms

The Setas de Sevilla is an undulating canopy in the center of the historic center, north of the Seville Cathedral, that is unlike anything you’ve seen anywhere else in the world. The wooden sculptural canopy is huge, 480 feet long by 220 feet wide by 85 feet high and purportedly the largest wooden structure in the world. It consists of six connected “parasols” resembling mushrooms, hence its common name. (It was originally called the Metropol Parasol and that may still be its official name).

You can walk around under the canopy at street level for no charge. Paid entry (€15.00) gets you into the below ground museum displaying Roman artifacts found during construction, an upper-level restaurant, and walkways that wind through and over the top of the structure that give great views of the surrounding city.

What We Didn’t Do, But Should Have

Basically, what we didn’t do was give ourselves another day or two to more fully explore Seville. Our visit, though, was on a two-week vacation with a packed itinerary that also took us to several sites Portugal (see my posts on Lisbon, Sintra, and Faro and the Algarve) and several more in Andalusia (see future posts on Cordoba, Granada, and Ronda), so we would have had to cut out something that we very much wanted to see.

But if we did have some additional time, we would have taken in the Barrio Santa Cruz district (to the north and east of the Cathedral and the Real Alcazar) and Maria Luisa Park, done a food tour, and visited a few of the city’s many museums and art galleries. But that’s for the next time, if we ever return.

Conclusion

Seville is a wonderful city, full of history, magnificent architecture, friendly people (although anti-tourism sentiment there is growing), charming neighborhoods, quality restaurants and cafes, many museums, and beautiful parks and plazas. It’s known for its cuisine, nightlife, and lively modern culture. I can’t imagine any visitor to Seville coming away disappointed.

Posted August 30, 2024