A week of Moorish discovery in Andalusia
After Portugal, we took a short flight with TAP from Lisbon to Seville to begin a week of travelling around Andalusia by train.
This part of Spain is all about its Moorish history as ‘Al Andalus’ under Islamic rule from the early 8th century until Granada finally fell to the Spanish Reconquista by it’s Catholic monarchs in 1492. I had studied this at high school, which was a long time ago, but inevitably had forgotten most of what I’d learned of King Ferdinand, Queen Isabella and their exploits. What was left behind in Seville, Cordoba and Granada is an incredible legacy of palaces and mosques that gives you an idea of the scale of their reign. We’d decided the best way to explore these 3 cities that are linked across arid plains was by Spain’s very fast AVE trains, and when we realised how narrow the roads are in the historic centres of these cities, and how difficult parking would be, we were very glad to have not hired a car!
It’s important to reset your body clock when visiting Southern Spain, even from Portugal, as the day definitely starts and finishes a lot later to reflect the climate. Seville is apparently officially the hottest city in Europe, so most shops don’t open until 10am, many smaller businesses still continue the tradition of shutting after lunch during the hottest part of the day (usually around 230-5pm). We enjoyed trying some of the cities’ many tapas restaurants, where dinner service usually starts around 8pm and is busiest after 9pm, so try earlier if you don’t have a reservation! It’s not unusual to see entire families with small children enjoying a meal at midnight.
We’d done our homework in advance about the likely tourist hotspots however, with September being peak season due to it being slightly cooler than the oppressively hot summer months. We had pre-booked entry into the two main attractions in Seville, being the extraordinary gothic cathedral – the largest of its kind in the world, and the even more impressive nearby Alcazar. The interior of the cathedral is vast, with an amazing vaulted ceiling, 80 side chapels and the largest altar place in the world. The Alcazar is a vast royal palace with 1000 years of history, elegant courtyards, rich baroque tapestries and Renaissance works of art, it’s spectacular, but the gardens are even more so with its pink bougainvillaea, palms and fountains. Also impressive was the massive ‘Plaza de Espana’, a 20min walk from the centre, but which doesn’t require a ticket or pre-booking.
From Seville, we took a great private day tour to several of the Pueblos Blancos (“white villages”) in the Northern part of Cadiz and Malaga, within the Sierra de Grazalema National Park, including Zahara de la Frotera and finishing at the very popular tourist attraction of Ronda, a mountaintop town that’s set dramatically above a deep gorge. This gorge separates the city’s 15th-century “new” town from its old town, dating to Moorish rule. Puente Nuevo, a stone bridge spanning the gorge, has a lookout offering amazing, albeit vertiginous, views. Ronda could also be visited enroute from Malaga to Seville if you had a car.
We then took the fast AVE train from Seville to Cordoba (40mins). It’s a good idea to arrive a little earlier to check in for these high-speed intercity trains, as there’s a bit of a queue at the station due to baggage security screenings at the platform. Cordoba is much smaller than Seville and the centre is a maze of narrow whitewashed streets. One evening, we were heading towards a local restaurant for dinner only to find the narrow streets completely blocked by hundreds of people watching a procession as a statue of the virgin Mary was carried aloft through the neighbourhood accompanied by a full brass band swaying to the music and wafted incense. It was a mesmerising spectacle. We had pre-purchased entry to the Mezquita, the vast mosque that dominates the historical centre, built when Cordoba was the epicentre of Moorish rule in Spain. Inside, there’s a geometric maze of claret-striped archways in the Moorish style , but then at the heart is a gothic cathedral built after the reconquest to demonstrate catholic domination.
We then took the AVE train from Cordoba to Granada (1hr 30mins), reaching speeds up to 280kmh.
A fantastic tour of the extraordinary Alhambra Palace in Granada was a fitting high point to end a wonderful fortnight in Iberia. It’s hard to describe how amazing the Alhambra is, with its patios and palaces flanked by Arabesque stuccos and white marble terraces, it would have to be one of the most beautiful buildings in the world. It’s justifiably one of the most famous and visited attractions in all of Europe, but despite the tourist throngs in the city, the Alhambra felt remarkably tranquil, and not overcrowded at all when we went for our guided tour at 5pm. Our guide had a penchant for the dramatic storytelling, which kept everyone riveted throughout the 2+1/2 hour tour. Granada has a large student population, being home to one of the most popular universities in Spain, so as we strolled along the narrow winding streets lined with whitewashed houses in the historic Albaicín district, learning about the city’s fascinating medieval past, it felt like the city had a youthful atmosphere.
The next morning we hopped on the ALSA bus for the 2 hour drive back to Malaga Airport. After being surrounded by such incredible history and culture for as week, it felt quite a jolt to be joining the throngs of British holidaymakers flying back to London!
Curated journeys to suit every style and every one.
We have the world at our fingertips, let’s go and explore it.