Toulouse and Tarn 2

Tags

Canal du Midi, Franco-Prussian War, Orchestre National du Capitole de Toulouse, St-Exupery, Toulouse

Toulouse, Saturday. It had clearly rained overnight and was just starting to clear as I left L’Ours Blanc after breakfast.  A major daily market (Le marché Victor Hugo) was just opposite, so after a quick look around that, I set off on another walk, which was planned to include some considerable time indoors.  In fact the weather was not as appalling as had been forecast, and for most of my tour today I did not open my umbrella.  I made my way down to the Cathédrale St-Etienne, which curiously was made up of two very different and offset parts, as can be seen from this plan,

The small print includes the word ‘romane’. This is not Roman, but romanesque, a trap for many tourism translators.

from this backwards look,

 

(forwards look from the same spot)

and this sideways view, taken from as far away as I could get.  I have to say, I was not particularly thrilled by this building, but perhaps the weather, which was not only damp but cold, was affecting my mood.

My planned walk took me past via the Monuments aux Morts, where there was a ceremony going on.

Apartments lining a long green walk

At the other end, a monument to those who died in the 1870-71 Franco-Prussian war

A series of adjacent public parks was my next goal, and I was amused to discover that the Grand Rond was also known as the Boulingrin – from ‘bowling green’! (Though I saw no-where for that game, or boules for that matter, to be played.) 

Now why did I suddenly think of the UK Parliament when I saw this duck-house?!

Antoine St-Exupéry

In due course I arrived at the Jardin des Plantes, where the grey sky did not enhance the vegetation, of which I took few photos.

A recent monument to those in the Midi-Pyrénées region who saved the lived of Jews during WWII

I could find nothing about this, but imagine the gateway itself dates from classical Roman times.

But I was delighted to find that around this waterfall was not just one family of ducks and recently hatched ducklings, but another with rather older ones.  There was other wildlife in the park.

Red squirrel, common in France as grey ones have not yet spread much from the SE of the country to oust them

Terrapin

A proud cockerel, in fact leading his harem

After this I spent a long while in the Muséum de Toulouse, a really excellent earth sciences collection, the entire subject of the next post.  From here I made my way to the Canal du Midi, which runs at this point roughly parallel and about a mile from the Garonne. I hoped for lovely views, as I had experienced elsewhere on that canal some years previously.  But no, there was a main road running beside it on both sides, and again the grey skies made it look even less interesting. And it was starting to rain, and it was cold. Looking backwards, shortly before I left the canalside, I was able to confirm that the water, as I had sensed, had indeed for a short while been above the level of my head.  My walk took me past this commemorative statue, and to a bookshop to find a map for the second part of my trip.

 

As I left the FNAC (which chain I had been told 30 years previously was ‘a very good bookshop’, but which is now much more concerned with multimedia) it was pouring once more and I was only too pleased to get back to my hotel, via Le Capitole where I bought a ticket for an evening concert, and an organic food store where I picked up a snack for my evening meal.

You would think that since: I had bought my concert ticket at Le Capitole; which had an auditorium (well, I learned later that it was more an opera house); the orchestra giving the concert was called the Orchestre National du Capitole de Toulouse; and there being nothing on the handbill or ticket to say where the concert was – that it would be at Le Capitole itself.  So when I turned up a in very good time for the start of the concert and found not a single door opened in either Le Capitole or the Hotel de Ville, after two complete tours around both, I was completely mystified.

I found one light on behind one door, the stage door.  So I was pleased to find that this would open, and that a concierge was there, so I was able to ask how I could get in to the concert.  He told me there was no performance that evening, to which I replied that I had bought a ticket for one that very afternoon.  Ah, I wanted the Halle aux Grains, he told me.  Where was that I asked.  (Le Capitole being so close to my hotel, I had left my map in my room.)  Did I know the Metro?  No, I hadn’t used it (and didn’t fancy having to faff around now discovering how it worked.)

Anyway, thanks to him and a couple of other good citizens of Toulouse, I arrived on foot at the Halle aux Grains (via the afore-mentioned Monuments aux Morts) just in time not to get in for Schumann’s Manfred Overture. When I was let in afterwards to a convenient seat marginally better than the one I had bought (its proper tenant had not turned up), I enjoyed an excellent Prokofiev Second Violin Concerto and Beethoven’s Eroica Symphony (called Héroique in French).

Photo snuck during applause, French horns taking their bow

This really was a first-class concert and I was glad to have made the effort, the enjoyment added to by a good chat with the geography professor mentioned in my previous post.  She told me that this hexagonal building, the home of this orchestra for the last 40 years, had, after it stopped serving as a cereals market, been among other things a boxing venue!

 

It was absolutely tipping it down when I emerged after the concert, and I decided that the time had come to find out how to use the metro (i.e. how to buy a ticket for and follow that metro plan – with only two lines the latter was not a problem).  I was very pleased that I did not have to walk back the half hour, two stops, to my hotel in that downpour.

Toulouse and Tarn 1

Tags

Bernuy, Garonne, Le Murano, Occitan, Ours Blanc - Victor Hugo, St-Sernin, Toulouse

Toulouse, Friday pm.  I had a short break in SW France recently. I flew into Toulouse Airport, and spent two nights in the city, which I had not visited before, followed by three nights in the countryside, based at Lisle-sur-Tarn.  I had been in the rural area in April/May 1990, and ever since then had wanted to go back to see the lovely countryside, and particularly the wildflower meadows, which I hoped were still there.

The weather forecast was telling me that Friday would be lovely, that Saturday would be awful, and that the remaining three days would be light grey and showery.  About Friday it was right.  It was gorgeously warm.  By the time I had taken the shuttle bus into the centre ville, found my hotel (the excellent two-star Ours Blanc – Victor Hugo, but NB there are also three- and four-star Ours Blancs in the immediate vicinity – as I found out before finding mine!) and had settled in, it was mid-afternoon. Wanting to take full advantage of the only good weather, I planned a walking route, starting at the tourist office in Le Capitole, the fifteenth century keep (Confusingly in French ‘donjon’!) prettified many years later, right by the Hotel de Ville, which was quite animated. 

I walked on to the Garonne, which, like all the rivers I was to see in the following days (the Tarn and the Aveyron were the others) is very wide, an effect exaggerated by my panoramic photo of it.  I was beginning to suspect that Toulouse had an awful lot of students, though I was puzzled to see them here on a Friday afternoon.  From my experience when I had lived in Poitiers, and had taught at its university, I would have expected all the students to vanish back home after lunch that day.  But I was to learn the following evening from my neighbour at a concert, a retired geography professor at Toulouse University, (who had ‘loved’ her job) that its status was such that students came from far and wide to study at the huge university, unlike most in France which attract just fairly local young people.

A 16th century Merchant’s house, the Hotel de Bernuy, now a state high school

This was shut for restoration works

I arrived too late to visit the church of St-Sernin, but found its exterior very pleasing.

I couldn’t work out whether this was a heavily restored old building or a brand new one. It appeared to be a small apartment block. Its detail certainly seemed quite old.

All the road names were in French and Occitan, though I read later that using this old language for place names was somewhat fanciful, since no-one now speaks it.

Would I resist this chocolate shop right next door to my hotel?  I was intrigued by this drawing of a bear in the lobby of the hotel.  Had they had some famous illustrator to stay in 2013?  I took dinner at ‘Le Murano’, a short way away on the Boulevard de Strasbourg.

Magret de canard on a bed of varied and unusual vegetables

 

 

USA 2018 (4) A day with Nicole

Tags

Bedford NH, Dunkin' Donut, Durham NH, Hampton Beach, Isle of Shoals, Jackson Hole CO, Lincoln NH, Manchester NH, Natural Habitat, New Hampshire, Portsmouth NH, River House Portsmouth NH, University of New Hampshire

USA 2018 (4) A day with Nicole, and then moving on. Thursday and Friday 15th/16th February. Fewer photo opps, but no less enjoyable.  Well, the Thursday anyway.

Nicole first took me to the New Hampshire coast.  The state’s coastline is only 19 miles long, but it has some historic connections.  We started at Hampton Beach, and drove northwards to Portsmouth, where we had coffee (not nearly as good as Geoff’s!) in a Dunkin’ Donut, before moving on to Durham to pick up their older daughter, Claire, who is in her first year at the University of New Hampshire, reading maths and really enjoying the chance to be with others who love the subject.

Back to Portsmouth, where we had a delicious lunch at a seafood place there. I had lobster roll, and clam chowder, which I would never have know to choose from the extensive menu without my relatives’ help.  Lots of natter, a wander around the port,

Um, a merganser?

back to Durham to deposit Claire,

A historic submarine on display

Rivers were freezing

Hall of residence – called ‘dorm’ there.

and back to Bedford.

I know. Bedford, Manchester (a former cotton town), Lincoln, Portsmouth (a port), Durham, all within not much more than an hour or so of each other! And all inside (New) Hampshire!

I didn’t stay up too long, as I was to have another very early start and stretched day on the Friday.

Geoff drove me to Manchester Airport to catch a 6 a.m. plane to Newark, there to change for Denver, Colorado, where I was to catch a flight after a four-hour wait to Jackson Hole, Wyoming, two time zones further westwards across the States from NH.

I think this was at Denver, but perhaps it was at Newark.  Anyway, delighted as I was to see this, I was glad not to be flying in it! (Though in other circumstances…)

The first two flights went fine, but there was an hour’s delay before the third took off. The reason? Just a broken seat.  But as the flight was 100% full, it had to be repaired before take-off.  As a result, and there was also of a slight muddle – no-one’s fault – over where the taxi meeting me was to take me to. So instead of arriving with an hour or so to spare before meeting all my companions for the next 6 days, I was technically 30 minutes late. The briefing over dinner had started – though I missed little I was told, and the meal hadn’t actually begun.

Once at the hotel, the Lexington, where I was to sleep, I was able to examine the cold-weather gear the company – Natural Habitat – was lending me for the week, including these absolutely excellent boots!

Only 21 hours  between rising and getting to bed this time.

USA 2018 (3) A day with my cousin

Tags

Black-capped chickadee, covered bridge, Erratics, Flume Gorge, Franconia Notch, House finch, Ice Castles, Lincoln NH, Manchester NH, Mount Lafayette NH, Mourning dove, New Hampshire, Pemigewasset, White-breasted nuthatch

USA 2018 (3) A day with my cousin. Wednesday 14th February.  Geoff had kindly taken time off work to be with me from midday on. Again rising later than the rest of the family, I had an enjoyable morning watching antics at the bird feeder.

Black-capped chickadee

Mr and Mrs House finch

Mr and Mrs Mourning dove (rather smaller than UK doves)

White-breasted nuthatch

But it was not only birds. The following sequence is a compilation of many attempts by the same squirrel.

Shall I try jumping? (It’s a long way down!)

I’ll have a scratch and a think

OK, perhaps not.

(But as this photo shows, the following day…)It was of course a great pleasure to get to know the affectionate Coco and Bam, sister littermates.

After an early lunch, Geoff and I set off on some local errands, including visits to a bank in Manchester for me and to their younger daughter’s school for her, and then headed northwards, while not leaving the state of New Hampshire.

Geoff had offered me the chance to see a covered bridge, once frequent but now sometimes preserved as historic features.

The bridge went over the Pemigewasset River

We were due to visit an attraction, the Ice Castles at Lincoln, later on, and swung by them now, in full sunlight. Other attractions there included a collection of trains.

Geoff then took me to the Flume Gorge at Franconia Notch State Park, where we took a short walk. I was not really shoed for more, but was very grateful to be wearing Nicole’s parka. Lovely to walk amongst such thick snow. 

Erratics abound (and to be clear, an erratic is a geological term for a boulder where it shouldn’t be, moved there by glaciers!)

Another covered bridge, a serendipitous find, to which we did descend

Then on briefly to see Mount Lafayette, from a distance, where we rang Geoff’s mother in the UK from the car, lost the signal, and picked it up shortly afterwards. As one not quite as familiar with technology as the next generation, I found this easy and clear contact all very weird – and it was free!

After taking coffee and dessert back in Lincoln, we kept our appointment with the Ice Castles. 

The adult slide

which I did enter

but which was much, much steeper than I expected, and from which my exit was not nearly as elegant as this. I wished I had taken a video – but not enough to choose to do the slide again!

I did wonder about elf ‘n’safety – what if one of those icicles fell on one’s head?

Nightfall is the most popular time to visit.

Thanks, Geoff, for a great day out!

 

Andalucia 7

Tags

Andalucia, Andalusia, Donana National Park, Egyptian grasshopper, Egyptian locust, El Rocio, Hotel Toruno, Iberian lynx, Naturetrek, red deer, Romeria del Rocio, Wild West

Andalucia, El Rocio and Doñana National Park.  The Doñana wetlands are the largest in Europe – except that they were almost dry at this time of year, the effect exacerbated by the farmers who take much of the water for irrigation, especially of strawberries.  We were staying at the Toruño hotel.

Note the hitching posts

On the wall of the reception area showing the species we might expect to see

The hotel restaurant, over the way from the main building. What appear to be tall hitching posts are bar counters for horsemen!

This was in the small town of El Rocío (‘the dew’), quite the most extraordinary town I have ever visited.  It was like driving into the Wild West. When you think of it, the Wild West may well have been modelled on such places in the first place – except that in this case much of the town has only been built from the 1950s onwards,.  We were told that it is known as the International Town of the Horse, though my researches since have not been able to find out much about that.  But what El Rocio is known for is a pilgrimage, the Romeria del Rocío, at Pentecost each year, which attracts up to a million people. These can arrive on horseback, in horse-drawn carriages and in wagons.  For there is no tarmac in El Rocío itself. The ‘roads’ are laid entirely with sand.  (Another blogger has written much more fully – and elegantly – about the town here.)

The remaining posts about my trip to Andalucia will be by theme, rather than day by day accounts.

The remains of this one will introduce El Rocío and the National Park, the next the entirely different Sierra Moreno where we spent the second part of our wildlife tour, then the remaining three posts will relate the wildlife we found  –  and some domestic animals.  But back to El Rocío. Internationally known for it or not, it is certainly a town for horses, and there is much evidence of the pride of place given to them. Here are two ordinary ‘roads’ and the sign at the restaurant where we ate lunch at one day.

Yes, cars are allowed

When we got back from a morning drive on the Tuesday, instead of sheltering from the blistering heat, I went out to explore El Rocío for a short while. 

I thought I was perhaps the only person about (‘the English(wo)man out in the midday sun’) but these three horsemen greeted me cheerily.

Huge pilgrimage needs huge church

The sign says that in 2001 the Andalucían authorities had declared this species of olive, endemic to the region, a ‘Natural Monument’. (If only all regional declarations in Spain were so benign.)

There were two young cats entertaining us with their antics at each of our two outdoor dinners there, siblings probably, and here is one of them just before we left at midday on the Wednesday. Horses. I had looked round from my meal on the Tuesday evening and seen one of the high bar counters being used! And I took these two photos from the van as we returned from our second morning drive. 

The head of the woman exercising the horse at the end of rope in the ring is just visible

El Rocío is right on the edge of the Doñana National Park.  These four photos were taken a short walk from the hotel.  For most of the year, there is a lagoon hugging the whole of one side of the town. However, we could just see a very distant shimmer of water, all that remains until the rains come. (Nearly two weeks on, I don’t think they have done so yet. And yet my guidebook says that October has one of the highest rainfalls of the year in Andalucia.  Climate change?)

Horses are everywhere around the town, and in the National Park, grazing where they can, sadly some of them in an emaciated condition.

Most of the birds were too far away to be well identified.

Two-inch long Egyptian grasshopper, also known as the Egyptian locust, but no threat to crops and vegetation.  Here at a wildlife visitor centre.

Lizard with attitude, same place

These remaining pictures were taken out as we explored early in the morning or as the day drew to an end, deeper in the national Park, looking especially for Iberian lynx.

The long shadows are of humans. The flat brown bit would be under water earlier in the season.

And these red deer stags were a distant vision on the ‘lagoon’ just before we left El Rocío.

 

Andalucia 6

Tags

Alameda de Hercules, Andalucia, Andalusia, Andalusian rococo, Flamenco museum, jasperware, Kay Woo, Metropol Parasol, Museo del Baile Flamenco, Naturetrek, Pedro Moreno, rococo, San Salvador Seville, Sevilla, Seville

Last day in Seville.  I only had the morning.  I walked to the flamenco museum, the Museo del Baile Flamenco (baile is ‘dance’), just a few minutes from my hotel, and as I bought my entrance ticket, I regretted that I would not be there that evening to go to a show by the national flamenco dance company, (while not regretting my inability to attend the classes they offered!)  It being early on a Monday morning, I had the place almost to myself.  The first room in the museum had giant screens showing videos of various aspects and meanings of flamenco – I had no idea that there was so much subtlety involved.  I had never previously fully appreciated the skill and athleticism required of flamenco dancers.  Further rooms went into greater detail which was lost on me, but nevertheless gave great pleasure to the eye.  On the top floor was a temporary exhibition of beautiful sculptures by Kay Woo.  I loved them, and the pieces were so reasonable that I could have been tempted, but for various practical considerations.  I particularly loved these two, about 15 inches high. Finally there was, in the basement, a room of drawings by Pedro Moreno, costume designer.   I now understood why there were so many shops in the immediate vicinity selling very beautiful and very expensive flamenco dresses.  (I had been near the window of one of them the previous evening as I ate my tapas.)

With my cathedral entry ticket had come a free entry to San Salvador, the church on my hotel doorstep as it were, so I took advantage of that (while paying for an audioguide).  This was the second largest church in Seville, but I have to say that rococo is just not my thing.  Entertaining, but to my eyes not aesthetically pleasing, far too fussy – many no doubt would disagree. 

I could find nothing to tell me what this was – a processional item? It appeared to be of gilded solid silver.

All round the church were altarpieces of various degrees of ornamentation

I did like this more restrained and classical pulpit, one of a matching pair,and the soundboard above it, which made me think of Wedgwood jasperware.

This main altarpiece was described as being the ultimate expression of rococo art as interpreted in lower Andalucia.

After these two visits I was gasping for a drink, and I wandered on northwards into the Macarena district.  Sadly it would not have been possible to go up to the top of the Metropol Parasol, as it does not open on Mondays, but I found a simple bar, serving tapas as well, and partook there, looking on at these Roman columns, in the Alameda de Hércules, a boulevard originally laid out in 1574 on drained marshland.  It fell on hard, even disreputable, times, but is now, after very recent redevelopment by the authorities, becoming a pleasant place once more.  The columns, with weathered statues  of Julius Caesar and Hercules on top, were originally elsewhere in Seville, and three others remain there.

It soon had to make my way back to the hotel to pick up my luggage, but I had time to stop at the Italian icecream shop, open this time, and to sit in the Plaza Nueva to consume my choice there, and then to check on how I could buy a ticket for the tram which I was to take shortly.  That all went very smoothly, including a ticket inspection, but, 5 minutes into the 15-minute journey, I had a call from Naturetrek in the UK.  “Sorry, the flight you are going to meet is delayed by two hours.”  But as I was by now on my way to the airport, and had luggage with me, I decided to continue to where I would pick up the airport bus, at San Barnardo. There I received kind and unsolicited guidance from locals who, seeing my suitcase, told me this was the airport bus coming just now.

At the airport I met up with Naturetrek guides/naturalists Niki and Simon, who live in southern Spain, right by the Straits of Gibraltar, and who are, in their own words, bird migration geeks. The time passed quickly until my companions for the next five days came though the arrivals gate, with quite a tale to tell about the travails of their flight.  Soon forgotten though as we made our way to El Rocio, on the edge of the Doñana National Park, a most extraordinary small town.

Andalucia 5

Tags

Andalucia, Andalusia, Archivo de Indias, Bar Europa Seville, Christopher Columbus, La Giralda, Pierre Dancart, Sevilla, Seville, Seville Cathedral, St Paul's Cathedral

Seville Cathedral. Having indeed added to my stock of nougat, I made my way mid Sunday afternoon to the Cathedral, to be confronted with a long queue.  As I sat on the steps of the Archivo de Indias wondering what to do, feet sorely in need of a rest, I firmly resisted the temptation to take a pony trap ride – I felt so sorry for all those many creatures, trotting around the hot streets of Seville all day. When I eventually looked up from my guidebook, I saw that the queue had reduced in length quite considerably, so I joined it.

I had already taken these exterior pictures of parts of cathedral the previous day. This is of a replica, placed near the entrance to the cathedral, of the bronze weathervane depicting Faith on the top of La Giralda.   With almost no commentary, here is a selection of the photos I took inside. (Audioguides are wonderful, but you have no record of what they tell you.  I do recall however that listeners, English-speaking ones anyway, are informed that this cathedral is the third largest Christian church in the world, after the Vatican and St Paul’s Cathedral, London.  However, size depends on how you measure it – St Paul’s comes well down according to this list!) 

I loved the variety of marbles at the entrance to the retro choir

Tomb of Christopher Columbus

Above it, noticed by scarcely anyone, this magnificent clock

The Main Sacristy

Impossible to do justice to the oval Chapter House (above) in a photo, so here’s a video.

 

 

This grill was forged 1518-32, and protects…

The great altarpiece, the work of just one man, Pierre Dancart, who worked on it between 1482 and 1526

La Giralda, was the Moorish minaret, finished in 1198. In the 14th century, original Muslim spheres were replaced by Christian symbols, and in 1568 the renaissance belfry was added.  At the end of a tiring day, I had decided not to go up it unless there was a lift, which was unlikely.  However, when I found that in fact to go up meant walking up 34 slopes, not hundreds of steps, I decided to embark on them and see how I did.   At each quarter turn there is a little notice telling you how many slopes you have done, so, distracting myself with mental arithmetic to tell me what proportion I had done, I did find myself at the top of the 34 – only to find there were another 17 steps.  (I suppose that was the renaissance bit.)  There were slopes, not steps, originally, so that horses could be ridden up.  Splendid views of central and greater Seville from the top.  Somewhere near the middle of this one is my hotel. For the evening, after a long rest, I went out seeking another tapas restaurant, one which had a reasonable number of patrons, but which was not too noisy.  In fact being Sunday evening there were many fewer people around, and less choice of eating places. But I found the modest Bar Europa met all the criteria, and I had a really excellent meal.  Sadly the (Italian) ice-cream bar I had identified previously was shut, so I had to forgo a dessert!

 

Andalucia 4

Tags

Andalucia, Andalusia, Archivo de Indias, Carlos V, Charles V, Mudéjar, Murillo Gardens, parakeet, Pedro I, Real Alcazar, Sevilla, Seville, Seville Cathedral

Real Alcazar, Seville, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, Sunday 22nd October. The Moorish rulers, who had conquered Andalucia in 711, had constructed the great fortress, the walls of which you can’t help but see if you are in central Seville.  At the re-conquest of Southern Spain by Christian rulers in the 13th and 14th centuries, not all the Moors were expelled.  Some craftsmen were allowed to remain, and we learned a lot about the Mudéjar (‘those permitted to stay’) influences on architecture as many subsequent rulers redesigned the former palace.  Pedro I ordered a complete redesign of the interior in 1364, and Carlos V (1516-56) was another significant contributor to its current appearance. Further developments continued up to the 19th century, notably to the gardens within the walls, which I had skirted the day previously as I walked through the Murillo Gardens and to the Archivo de Indias.  The palace is still used by Spanish monarchs when they visit Seville.

Public entry was by a fortress gate.  Here is a splendid Mudéhar interior entry.

It was not only to avoid visitors that eyes drifted upwards much of the time:

A rare chance to look at a floor, unencumbered by visitors.

So many thousands of details to be admired.

An organ in the renaissance part of the palace, developed by (Holy Roman Emperor) Carlos V.

Frustratingly I managed to delete a detailed video I made of this great tapestry of Spain and surrounding countries, seen, in effect from high over the eastern Pyrenees, looking south. To me it was amazing that those who could climb no higher than the highest mountain could imagine this satellite view of their country, and of north Africa, Italy and the south of France.

The Ambassadors’ hall, where kings did most of their governing, was a wonder, only partly captured even on a video.

 

There were peaceful – and not so peaceful – courtyards. 

Mudéhar architecture on the ground floor, renaissance on the first, and a glimpse of an original fortress tower top left

Known as the baths of Maria de Padilla

There were several acres of gardens, including those designated as French, and English.

The Fountain of Mercury

Today’s feline

As I sat in the gardens eating my apple, I was entertained by the squawking of these parakeets,

and was surprised to find, on zooming the camera, that they had not only been provided with perches in the palm trees but that some had identity tags.

 

Oranges

and lemons

 

One of several rose gardens

 

I was in trouble for stepping onto the grass to photograph this nearly moulted peacock…

and his hens.

Water and fountains are very important in Mudéhar style

I left the Real Alcazar mid-afternoon, with still the Cathedral to visit before returning to my hotel.  Not omitting another visit to the nougat shop.

 

Andalucia 3

Tags

Andalucia, Andalusia, Andujar, Archivo de Indias, Cadiz, Columbus, Cordoba, Donana National Park, Guadalquivir, Guadalquivire Hydrographic Confederation, Seville

An exhibition of maps and other documents about the Rio (river)  Guadalquivir (from Arabic, al-Wadi al-Kabir, or Great Valley). I adore maps, and this exhibition was about the river that linked all three places I was to stay in over this coming week.  Flowing roughly east-west into the Atlantic alongside the Doñana National Park, the river is navigable to Seville, once as far as Cordoba, and rises beyond Andùjar near where we were to finish our wildlife trip.

The Archivo de Indias, right by the Cathedral and the Real Alcazar, contains all the records of Spanish exploration (I did not see the word ‘colonisation’ anywhere) of the Americas. Among their most precious documents are the letters to Columbus from Ferdinand and Isabella. The building itself was, for a comparatively short time in the 16th and 17th centuries, the Trade Exchange, but the silting up of the river, along with disease, caused the main trading port, and so the exchange, to be moved to Cadiz. After some years as what we would now called squats, the building was attributed, late in the 18th century, for its present national use. It underwent great renovation to make it suitable.
But I was there for maps and river. And what a fabulous exhibition it was. It was to mark the 90th anniversary of the establishment of the Guadalquivir Hydrographic Confederation, and its themes were the river as a resource, a threat (mainly from floods), a tamed space, its projects, and technical aspects, with just sufficient English captions to make it comprehensible to me. This is how the exhibits were mounted, in the midst of thousands and thousands of filing boxes. Here are just a very few of the photos I took. 

Floods of 1772-3

Palace of San Telmo, 1873.

 

Andalucia 2

Tags

Andalucia, Andalusia, Archivo de Indias, Bizet, Carmen, Fabrica Real de Tabacos, Guadalquivir, Hotel San Alonso XIII, Iglesia de la Magdalena, Iglesia Santa Ana, La Giralda, Mérimée, Murillo, Puente de Isabel II, Puente de San Telmo, Real Alcazar, Royal Tobacco Factory, Sevilla, Seville, Seville Cathedral, Torre d'Oro, Triana, University of Seville

Continuing my ’90-minute’ walk in Seville. After those shops (previous post) the guidebook said that I would come across the Iglesia de la Magdalena, built in 1709 on the site of an earlier Moorish mosque. So I just walked straight past this of course.But it turned out to be the side entrance. Despite the fact that a mass was in progress, I was encouraged to walk around at the back and sides of the church by a member of the congregation standing by to greet visitors. The building proved to be anything but plain on the inside.

A reminder of Seville’s naval triumphs

And when, continuing on my route, I went round to the front of the church, it was more recognisable as such.I went on to the Triana district, the other side of the Guadalquivir river, over the Puente (bridge) de Isabel II, looking north
and looking south.Can’t resist an indoor market.
My route then took me by many ceramic shops.I was beginning to want a drink and a sit, and I was delighted to find a quiet square, that of the 13th century Iglesia Santa Ana, Seville’s oldest church.

Still on the Triana side of the river, I continued along it for a short while, with a view of the Torre d’Oro.

Then back over the Guadalquivir River by the Puente de San Telmo, and into the Calle San Fernando, with a sighting of the Hotel Alfonso XIII, built between 1916 and 1928 for visitors to the Ibero-American Exposition, meant to boost the Andalucian economy, but sadly co-inciding with the Wall Street crash.

What’s this then? Ooh, it’s the University of Seville. Open to the public, so there’s another deviation from the walk.

First floor – and here, it would appear, there are actually some students

Pretty impressive for a university.  But even more impressive when you know it was a tobacco factory before that. Not just any old tobacco factory, but the Royal Tobacco Factory, employing 3000 women. You know, the one employing Mérimée and Bizet’s ‘Carmen’.  There were signs over doorways of former occupation, amongst them foremen, loos (still in use as such, though out of order this day) and stores.

 

Once more outside, I was still walking alongside the huge ex-tobacco factory, and was level with its chapel, when I noticed a wedding party arriving, and managed to get a photo through the grill as the bride emerged from the car.

Note the head-dress!

Into the Jardines de Murillo, named for the painter,where I sat to eat an apple, all the lunch I needed after the very full breakfast and in the great heat. Looking at my map, I realised that I was not far from the Archivo de Indias. I had seen advertised a temporary exhibition there which had really caught my eye. Put the words ‘maps’ and ‘river’ together, and they are a magnet to me. So I diverted,

On my way I noticed a tour guide pointing out this garden.  No idea what it was.

A first sighting of the Cathedral

A first sighting of the Real Alcazar, (‘Royal Fortress’)

and serendipitous further diversion took me past – or rather into – a nougat shop where I bought a large bar of the softer version, with tropical fruits, with the thought that I might well return.

 

(The next post will be exclusively concerned with the map and river exhibition and the building in which it was housed.)

Afterwards, it was time for another sit-down, and a drink, of fizzy water this time. And a photo of a sleeping cat which didn’t move the whole of the time I was there.

Back to my appointed route

A young woman had been idly stroking this cat in a quiet square, as she read a book.

Approaching the Giralda.And back to my hotel, via the Plaza de San Francisco and the Ayuntamiento once more. Too exhausted to explore more widely, I just took tapas in the hotel’s own restaurant later on that evening.