Tuesday, 6 February 2024

Andalusia 2019 - Part 11 - Granada

The day after the Alhambra, on our last day in Andalusia we visited Granada (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Granada). As you could see from the last photo in the last post, the Granada really does surround the Alhambra. 

View of the Alhambra from Granada: View of the Alhambra from Granada 

Granada was the fourth city we visited and the fourth completely different vibe. 

Granada had a much wider range of building styles, and some really cool lampposts: Modernist lamppost, the fitting around the bulb is a square broken down into smaller shapes. It is both unusual looking and very cool. 

This is just an ordinary building, I liked the tree striving to survive: Corner of a pebble wall at the bottom of a hill of houses. There is some graffiti on the white wall to the left, and a green tree growing out of the join between the white wall and the pebble wall. 

While I think the decoration at the top of this building is neat, it loses something without the rest of the building so have the building and then the close up shot: Yellow white multi-storey stone building, with the top window guarded by two angels and an eagle Close up of yellow white stone angels and the eagle 

Mudejar arch at the end of a row of shops: Left and right are rows of shops. In the front of the photo are people walking along the street. At the back is an orange stone arch in mudejar style. 

There was also a fascinating statue of Isabella the Catholic (unfortunately, I am foreign enough that I think of her as Isabella the Catholic. I am sure she actually has a regnal number and stuff). Statue of Christopher Colombus kneeling in front of Isabella the Catholic. The plinth is an off white stone, the figures are in bronze. Isabella dress cascades down the front of the plinth in ripples. 

I've never seen the ripple effect done by different colour material on such a large statue before. More information on the statue, and that it helped cause a riot, here - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monument_to_Isabella_the_Catholic_(Granada) 

Their Catholic majesties (don't look at me in that tone of voice) were pretty much the theme of the day as we spent most of our time in the Royal Chapel of Granada (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Royal_Chapel_of_Granada) which contains the tombs of Isabella and Ferdinand, as well as Joanna of Castile and Philip the Handsome. And some very cool artwork. 

It is an understandably fancy building, in what I've been told is Isabelline style, a variant on late Gothic. Pictures of the building
  Carved triptych over a door. The two saints are probably Saint John the Baptist and Saint John the Evangelist surrounding a Virgin and child. The roof behind it features lots of twisty gothicness. 

Because they get everywhere, I also suspect this of being a Hapsburg eagle holding the coat of arms of Isabella and Ferdinand.
  Decoration at the top of a door. It is the side of an eagle holding a shield. The design on the shield cannot quite be clearly seen. 

 We didn't get to see the San Juan de Dios Hospital (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/San_Juan_de_Dios_Hospital_(Granada)), which was our tour guide's favourite site in Granada (and may have been her favourite in all of Andalusia, Sharon being awesome that way), nor did we manage to have any tapas in the home of tapas (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tapas#Origin), but, all in all, it was a very successful trip, and I would recommend a visit to Andalusia to everyone.
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