We had to be in the Princess theatre at 7 am this morning to join our full day tour to Seville. We docked at Cadiz but needed a 2 hour bus ride to visit Seville. Needless to say it was a long day.
We had a good guide who got us to the Seville and the first stop which was the site of the 1929 world fair. Of course the architecture is completely different from what we are use to in Canada. We did have a chance to explore the complex. Most of the buildings are now used as government offices. Being Sunday everything was closed. However Seville was very crowded with many tourists. We were quite surprised to see so many tourist there so early in the season. Seville was a very important trading city receiving much of the tobacco and other goods that came from North America.
The next stop was a palace that was built withe the cross styles of Italy and the Moorish influence. We did have a local guide who used a fm system which made it very easy to follow the talk. The palace is located in the old part of the city. We then walked through the “old” Jewish section of the city. Most Jews were ordered out of the country hundreds of years ago as the king wanted Spain to be a Catholic country. It remains a very religious country today.
As we walked through the narrow streets we came across a “practice” for one of the upcoming parades. Easter is a very special time in Spain. Each church will carry a statue from their church through the streets to the main cathedral and back. The platform is very heavy and is carried by 25? men under the platform. They walk with someone calling the cadence. We just happened to come across one of the practices. There will be 61 of these individual church parades around Easter time. We did see the old wall of the city and the cathedral. It started as a Mosque built back when the Moors controlled Spain but was converted to a cathedral after they were driven out.
We had lunch in one of the downtown hotels. The best part was the bottle of wine on the table – the other 2 people did not drink. After we had some free time to walk around the main shopping area. We elected to walk down and along the river. the 2 hour ride back to the ship. It was a long day and the bus was quite quiet on the ride back to Cadiz.
Back at the ship we finally got some internet. That is why all the posts were done today. It took a bit of time to post all the posts since we started this cruise. A quick drink, dinner with another couple from California and then early to bed was the order of the day. We have another full tour tomorrow.
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