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Thursday 23rd. May 2013
(Seville cont.)
We slept reasonably well. I am still taking Augmentin for my
cold. The cough has subsided and my eyes are free of
conjunctivitis. I am still getting a tickling in my throat at
night that sends me off into a coughing fit. Usually a
Fisherman's Friend is all that is needed to fix that.
We boarded the bus at 8:30am and set off for a quick tour of
Seville. We passed the remaining section of Roman city wall and
arrived at the Royal Alcazar, a string of Royal Palaces
built by the Catholic Kings in the 14th Century. It is now the
residence of the Spanish Royal Family. We then made our way
through the Jewish Quarter, Santa Cruz, had a cup of coffee /
orange juice and made our way to the Cathedral of Santa Maria
(Catedral de Santa
María de la Sede) which is the burial place of Christopher Columbus,
and the Archbishop's palace. Like all
Catholic Cathedrals it is quite spectacular.
The tower (104metres tall) was a former minaret and was built
between 1184 and 1198. On top of it there is a 16th. century
weather vane, called the Giralda.
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| A statue of Carmen opposite the Plaza
de Toros |
Bell tower of Seville Cathedral |
The weather vane on top of the bell
tower |
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| The bull ring (taken on the way to
the cathedral) |
Seville Cathedral |
The Archbishop's Palace, Seville
Cathedral |
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| Seville Cathedral |
The Archbishop's Palace, Seville
Cathedral |
The Archbishop's Palace, Seville
Cathedral |
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| The Archbishop's Palace, Seville
Cathedral |
The Archbishop's Palace, Seville
Cathedral |
The Archbishop's Palace, Seville
Cathedral |
Took photos inside
of the statue of Isodol and the painting of St Anthony of Padua
(The Saint of lost things). I climbed the bell tower, formerly
a minaret and took photos. The inside of the tower has ramps
rather than steps and this is a concept that goes back centuries
to when all this was a mosque and someone had to climb it five
times a day to bring the population to prayer, and the mullah
rode a horse up to the top.
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Seville Cathedral |
St Anthony of Padu, Painting by El
Geco |
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| The Archbishop's Palace, Seville
Cathedral |
Seville Cathedral |
Seville Cathedral |
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| Seville Cathedral |
Seville Cathedral |
Tomb of Christopher Columbus, Seville
Cathedral |
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| View from the Bell Tower, Seville
Cathedral |
View from the Bell Tower, Seville
Cathedral |
View from the Bell Tower, Seville
Cathedral |
Some of us returned to the hotel at about 1:00pm to rest our
various ailments.
At 9:00pm we are scheduled to visit a Flamenco performance at El
Palacio Andaluz, which is just down the road from our hotel. This
is supposed to be the formal version of flamenco, rather than
the rough, wild version we saw in Granada. It was a good show
and finished at about 11:00pm.
Friday 24th. May 2013
We were on the bus at 8:30am and heading towards Cordoba. It was
overcast but still warm, about 20˚C.
We visited the Cordoba Cathedral which is a mixture of Islamic
and Christian architectural influences. There are over 1,000
circular columns that have been made from the remains of the
early Roman Christian church that stood on the site. These are
made from both granite and marble and have essentially been
recycled and had Islamic arches put on top of them when the
mosque was begun in 785AD. With the gradual decline of the Arabs
in Spain the site became a Christian Church and was consecrated
in 1236AD. The Christians tried demolishing the mosque but it
proved to be too difficult and so they just built in and around
it, resulting in a strange mixture of cultures and architecture.
At its peak the mosque is said to have held 20,000 worshipers.
We had lunch, took some photos around the old part of Cordoba
and then caught the high speed train from Cordova to Madrid.
The
journey was uneventful and took about 1¼
hours. The train was
remarkably quiet and smooth for one traveling so quickly.
Once in Madrid we were picked up by a new bus and driver and
taken to our hotel, The Hotel Abba Madrid. Our room is good
although it has a funny odour about it. It smells slightly as if
there is a blocked drain somewhere, but it is more likely to be
the cleaning agent they use here. Lucy once again took us on a
walking tour at about 7:30pm and showed us where to find the 24
hour deli, numerous eating places both cheap and expensive and
finally where to find the underground and how to buy tickets and
find our way around.
We had hamburgers and chips for dinner and went to bed around
10:30pm.
Saturday 25th. May 2013
It was a clear cool morning.
We had a hearty breakfast in the hotel (the fresh crisp bread
rolls are superb) and climbed onto the bus again at 9:00am. We
were given a site seeing tour of Madrid. We saw various
buildings including the stadium that is the home ground of Real
Madrid and a bronze statue of Don Quixote. This then ended in
the old section of town when we began walking for about an hour.
We took photos of the Plaza Oriente, the Royal Palace, the
Cathedral etc, then were guided through various pretty streets
and squares, a food court (where we went back and bought some
rolls for lunch) and finally we finished in the Plaza Mayor.
We
left the rest of the party who were taking the bus back to the Museo de Prado and walked down Calle de Atocha to the Musea
Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia. This is where there is a
special display of Salvador Dali paintings. We queued for about
an hour, only to be told that they had sold the last tickets for
the special display, but we were welcome to view the general
exhibition. Some members of our group managed to get tickets to
the Dali Exhibition but had to wait around to 6:30pm to gain
entry. We decided to view the general exhibition and were
greeted with room after room of paintings by Picasso (including
his Guernica painting), Miro, Dali
(his early works) and many other modern Spanish artists. Most of
these artists did their work in the 1920's and 1930's. It was
very impressive, but tiring.
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Guernica -
Pablo Picasso |
At a bit after 3:00pm we left the Queen Sophia gallery and found
the Atocha Metro station without any difficulty, bought two
tickets back to Avenida de America (€1.80 each), negotiated a
train change and made it back to the hotel by about 4:00pm
without even getting lost!
My right ear is still blocked and a little sore. My throat is
sore again and so I hope I am not about to get another bout of
what I have just had!
A point of interest:
Petrol is hovering around €1.40 per litre in Spain.
Sunday 26th. May 2013
Today is our last day of the
tour. Again the weather is perfect. It is a cool crisp sunny
morning that looks as though it will turn into a day in the mid
twenties. We have had weather like this for the whole trip. The
only rain was a short heavy shower of rain when we were visiting
the mosque in Casablanca. But that cleared within minutes
leaving clear blue skies.
At 10:15am we climbed into our bus for a day trip to Toledo. The
bus trip took just over an hour. We picked up a local guide and
were taken to a Damask factory/ toilet break. We viewed all the
jewelry and then climbed back onto the bus for a general
tour/photo opportunity trip around Toledo.
We then began walking and
visited the Santo Tome Church. This is a Church with a Mudéjar
tower dating from the 14th century. It is home to the famous
painting by El Greco, the Burial of the Count of Orgaz.
The church
dates from the 12th century, although it was completely rebuilt
in the early 14th century by the Count of Orgaz. The tower is
one of the best examples of the Mudéjar art characteristic of
Toledo. The two upper sections are made of brick, with two
groups of two and three windows with pointed horseshoe arches
scalloped with other lobed arches. The interior is home to one
of El Greco’s most famous paintings, the Burial of the Count of
Orgaz, which is on display in a special room. Photos were not
allowed but I managed to get one anyway!
After a 20 minute break for lunch we visited the local
Cathedral. It is the fifth largest cathedral in the world behind
St Peter's in Rome, St Paul's in London etc etc.
We then
shopped and explored for the next hour and a half before
catching the bus back to Madrid and preparation for the final
dinner etc.
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Monday 27th. May 2013
An early wake up call at
6:00am and pick up at 6:45am in the foyer of the hotel. Then
a trip to Barajas Airport, Madrid to catch a 9:30am Swiss
Air flight to Zurich (2hrs). The journey to the airport only
took 10 minutes or so. The Swiss Air check in didn't open
until 7:10am, so we had a bit of a wait. Then with some
difficulty we found the Swiss Lounge before catching our
flight. which took 1 3/4 hours.
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We arrived in Zurich. We
hade to get from gate A 72 to E42 to catch the flight to New
York, which left at 1:00pm. After some considerable walking
, a 3 minute ride on the Skymetro and Passport control we
arrived at Gate E42 just as it was boarding. This is an
Airbus A330 - 300 just like the one we flew from Hong Kong.
The estimated flight time is 8 1/2 hours. Our flight was
uneventful and we landed at JFK Airport just before 4:00pm
local time. We then sat in the plane while the airport
authority moved an Emirates A380 which was parked in our
docking stop. Once the plane door was opened there was a mad
rush to get to Security and Immigration. There must have
been 1,000 people trying to get through, many of whom were
Jewish men in their black coats and hats and long curly
hair. It took a good 45 minutes to get processed (Finger
prints and eye photos). Then we waited a further 30 minutes
for our luggage. We were not told that the luggage from
Swiss Flight LX014 had fallen off the carosel and was
stacked up over the other side where we couldn't see it. We
eventually got our luggage and then joined the mad rush to
hand in our Security forms that an official had just
stamped... why didn't he just keep it in the first place?
We then boarded the NYC Airporter bus that drove slowly down
the Van Wyck expressway, which seemed to have traffic lights
ever mile or so. I found it very strange that an expressway
has traffic lights!
We eventually arrived at our hotel (La Quinta Inn Manhattan)
in West 32 Street at about 7:00pm. The hotel is old (as is
much of NY) but the room has everything we need, including a
coffee maker, free WiFi, free breakfast and an
airconditioner that works.
Our room looks out onto the Empire State Building, and if
you lie on the floor and look out the window you can see the
top of it!
We wandered around the block, had some pizza for dinner. At
the shop we went to they had pre prepared the pizzas. So you
could select from an array of different pizzas and they
would hack off a portion and put it in the over to heat up.
West 32 Street is in the heart of the Korean part of town,
and so it is infested by Koreans. I haven't heard
anyone speaking english here since we arrived. I read that
one of the downsides of our hotel is the rubbish that is
stacked up in the street outside it. Well there it is,
neatly packed in plastic bags awaiting collection, but never
the less there are huge amounts of it.
We had a quick look at Macy's. The escalator from the third
floor up would make the old Harris Scarfe's shop in Adelaide
look like a new age shopping centre. It is quaint with its
battered timber sides and the wooden treads on the steps,
that neatly pass between cast iron fingers at the top and
bottom of each flight.
After a very very long day we went to bed at about 10:00pm.
First Impressions: A mix of Old and new ... Steam rising
from a sewer manhole cover in East 41 Street.
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