Friday 22 December 2023

Andalusia 2019 - Part 5 - Seville Cathedral

After the Alcazar, we went on to Seville Cathedral.
The outside featured many orange trees.   Photo looking up at an angle at a Seville orange tree.  The oranges are green.

It was a very impressive building.View of the roof.  Grey stone and frills. Balcony jutting out from the side of the cathedral, surrounded by trees.  There is the figure of a head, over some lines of light that look like a vertical sundial. 

We went inside. No photos because I tend not to inside churches, (not without explicit permission, holy sites are holy etc), so you will have to rely on websites for the indoor pictures. 

The big highlight is the tomb of Christopher Columbus (https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/tomb-of-christopher-columbus) which is full of symbolism. 

(In a statement to annoy L. the Assassin's Creed film did a very good job of recreating the inside) 

I then walked up to the top of the Giralda bell tower (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giralda). I cannot comment on whether the walkways are big enough to walk horses up and down, as the story goes, but they certainly were broader and were flat not stairs, so far easier to climb. 

Meet the Lizard of Seville Wooden model of a crocodile, hanging from the ceiling by chains Allegedly a real crocodile was a gift from the Sultan of Egypt for Alfonso X. It has been replaced with a wooden model since then. 

View from about mid way up View onto the roof of the rest of the cathedral.  The view is through a metal lattice that looks like diamonds 

View from about the top: View from the tower towards the river Guadalquivir (Betis to Romans).  The yellowish circular building with lots of arches is the bullring View back to the alcazar
View from the tower back towards the Alcazar 
Another view from the top This time the bullring is in the middle.  There is a modern circular tower, ribbed blue and brown sort of middle right

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