Seville-Gateway to the New World

Seville or Sevilla (seh-Vee-vah) in Spanish has been one of the most important Spanish cities since ancient times.  For the Romans it was a major port on the Guadalquivir River.  The Moors made it a capital of one of their Spanish Caliphates.  Under the Christians it became the capitol of Castile, the largest Kingdom in Spain.  However, in the middle ages Seville suffered severe economic damage due to the Black Death of 1348 and the expulsion of all Jews in 1391.  By the 16th century it was bigger and better than ever before due to new world explorers Amerigo Vespucci (whom the Americas are named after) and Ferdinand Megellan who both sailed from its great river harbor, discovering new trade routes and abundant sources of gold, silver, cocoa and tobacco.  In the 17th century Seville was Spain's largest and wealthiest city and its cultural center.  Seville's luck ran out again in the 18th century when the river harbor silted up and the Spanish empire crumbled.  But it got it's mojo back in the 19th century when it became a big stop on the Romantic "Grand Tour" of Europe and has hitched its fortunes to the tourism industry ever since.

We arrived after a 4 hour journey from Toledo to Seville via Madrid by once again using the excellent Spanish train system.  Unfortunately, the weather was overcast and cool.  We took a taxi to our apartment which is in the heart of Old Town Seville.  We met up with the owner and went through the paperwork.  After getting the keys we put our suitcases away and went to check out the area as tomorrow we are on an all day small group tour to see some of Andalucia's White Villages.

Enjoying lunch with wine on our train trip from Madrid to Seville

 Rita with May, the owner of our apartment.  She was such a lovely person.  We needed our passports for the paperwork and when we told her our story of having our bag pick-pocketed she was so upset that this would happen to us in Spain that she made a reservation for us at her friends Arab Spa, which she paid for.  And she gave us some excellent tips for local restaurants and bars.

This is our building (only the part with the balconies).  May owns the restaurant on the main floor so I assume she owns the building as well.  We are on the top two floors.  It is not as big as it looks as we only have the two balcony windows on each floor.  But we have three balconies, which is amazing if the weather gets hot and sunny again.

 The amazing view from our roof top balcony

 Some interesting structures that we stumbled across on our little walkabout