Seville, Spain – Real Alcazar & The Mushroom – Pt1

Seville is the capital city of the southern state of Andalusia.  It is home to 690,000 and what a beautiful picturesque city it is! Known as ‘The City where the Worlds Heart Beats’, the history flows through this city just like the mighty Rio Guadlaquivir.  The only navigable river in Spain and the lifeblood of this city in the early days.

The spring sky was blue overhead, the sunshine warm and the shadows cool.  Orange trees line the streets, there are hundreds of them, so leafy, bushy and green, some with remnant rounds of orange still peeping from the top upper most branches from last summer.  Avenues of beautiful pompoms of green above your heads giving off much needed shade in the brightness.

 

The streets of the central Barrio Santa Cruz where we are staying is the beating heart of the Old Town.  The buildings tall, balconied, colourful and with a touch of Arabic decoration.  Out door tables line the narrow footpaths in front of small tabernas and tapas bars and potted plants line the streets as decoration.  The old town is just buzzing with people all out and about enjoying the sunshine.

The bells of the Ghiraldia are ringing from the tower of the Cathedral that looms over everyone and everything in the Old Town, let’s get out and start exploring!  We are only staying steps away from all the main sights!

Welcome to the early morning line to the Palace of the Real Alcazar!  Luckily we had bought tix online from back in New Zealand….no queues for us, straight in through the Lion Gate!

This Palace was originally built by the Arabian rulers of Seville in 913. It was in the 11th Century it got its first major rebuild and a lot of that still stands today.  In the 13^th century it was taken over by the conquering Christians and all manner of Spanish royalty have lived here at some time throughout the ages leaving their mark too on the beautiful gardens and architecture.

Patio de las Doncellas – Patio of the Maidens is one of the first jaw dropping areas you come to. It features in Game of Thrones as the House Of Martell in sunny Dorne.  It is not a big area but is so delicate, serene and beautiful.  The sunken gardens look gorgeous and the detailed plaster work along the corridors is incredible.

The Royal Rooms were on the top floor looking out over the patio and these are the sumptuous tiled corridors that lead to them.  No access to the Royal Chambers sorry….

Walking into the palace at the far end of the patio is the Arco de Pavones, named after its Peacock motifs that decorate the portal leading out to the mighty throne room.  Rosie pondered this door a long time, peacock?  The shape of the door is like a peacock tail fan sagely whispered The Operator.

Here we are, the most amazing room in the palace, the Salon de Embajadores – Hall of Ambassadors – originally built as the throne room, it has a massive wooden dome overhead with star patterns symbolising the universe which was built in 1426.  It is just stunning from every angle.

Other rooms in the palace lead to amazing halls filled with priceless paintings and huge tapestries, the like we have only ever seen in the Vatican in Rome.

Outside are the Alcázars formal gardens.  They are tropical and lush looking………with a thin gallery at tree height where we walked around above the garden and could look down on it from either side.  It truly was a stunning visit, right in the heart of Seville.

Just around the corner from the Alcazar and where we are staying, sitting in this beautiful square is the Church of the Divine Saviour.  It didn’t really feature on Rosies radar but we visited it because it sold entry tickets to The Seville Cathedral.

Rosie and The Operator knew of a cunning plan, you buy a ticket here to this church and you can also get an add on ticket to The Cathedral and avoid the hour long queue to the Cathedral ticket booth (no online website to buy from).  Makes sense, with our tickets bought here we could skip the queue to the other main attraction of the city.  Rosie wasn’t really too bothered about visiting this church, but hey we have a ticket, so lets go inside for a browsy.  Well this innocuous church was just jaw dropping inside!

The 17^th century alter piece was incredible in its richness, size and 3D relief design.  My photos do not do it justice!  But wait, why have one alter when you could have two!  Yes there was another equally as gorgeous one!

They were also preparing for Easter.  These are the giant canopied Easter Floats which are being assembled for the parades that go around the streets of the town. Each parish has floats and this one was already incredible only half assembled!  The cage in the middle holds a giant statue of Mary, taken from the actual permanent Church Displays.  A long-embroidered gown is fitted to Mary and hung over the back. With all those candles lit and all that silver…it will look spectacular!

Off we went, around the corner into the new town to visit Las Setas, The Seville Mushroom, as the locals call it, or to be formal and call it by its real name, The Metropol Parasol.

The Mushroom has become something of a city icon since it was built in 2011.  Designed as a giant sunshade by a German architect it is said to be the world’s largest wooden structure.

It does have 30 meter high support pillars, that do look like mushroom stalks and a beautiful undulating honeycomb/spore like roof.  The light shines on it in an interesting luminescent kind of way….and it looks like it all just slots together.  You can take a lift up to the top where there is a walkway and killer views of the city.

A couple of hundred meters away from our apartment are so many bars, restaurants and cafes.  Strolling along in the evening looking for a place to eat at about 9.30 Rosie does not use Tripadvisor….we take on instead some of the advice from Jake, our food guide in Madrid.

For an authentic experience don’t pick a place where the advertising or blackboards are written in English.  Check! That eliminates three quarters on the street.   Look to see where the locals are gathering….well, its only 9.30, there are not that many out yet….so this wee place ………………must be perfect!  It is the only place with its three tables on the footpath empty.  Its not a pretty place compared to its neighbors, the huge tapas board is written in Spanish and it is very simple inside with a cranky looking waiting standing in the doorway.  Lets give it a crack!

Wow!  The food was that amazing we ate here every night we were in Seville.  Vermouth on tap, cranky service at our bad Espanol and from 0945 95% of the patronage was local.  We were in the heart of the buzzing street and were not being hurried to move along as Rosie noticed our neighboring restaurants were doing.  What a great time we had here google translating the menu board as worked our way down it.

Wandering home with a full belly Rosie cannot wait to show you around the rest of this amazingly beautiful town of Seville tomorrow.  We are planning on jumping the queue to visit The Cathedral, but first we thought we would go for an early morning walk to the Plaza Espana….join us so we can show you these monumentally huge and extraordinary sights.