Seville

Seville is a beautiful and vibrant city with its small squares,narrow labyrinthine streets, wrought- iron grilles, flower- bedecked balconies and atmosphere galore! It almost beats Paris as my favourite European city! It is divided into three regions - Macarena, Santa Cruz and Triana. It has stunning architecture, much of it Moorish and Baroque with magnificent tiles everywhere. The Guadalquivir River runs through Seville and it has lovely parks and boulevards, with orange trees everywhere. Miguel took us to the most lovely square last night called Plaza de Espagna. The beautiful old buildings were in red sandstone with a canal running through the square and ornate tiled bridges. Seville is a real mix of old and new. Many of the more modern buildings were built for the World Fairs in 1929 and 1992. We wandered through the lovely but touristy Santa Cruz area with the cathedral with its Giralda bell tower and we also visited the opulently tiled Pilatus Palace,which has been used in several films, such as 'Lawrence of Arabia.'
We started in Italica, the remains of a Roman town on the outskirts founded by Scipio in 206 BC! Emperors Hadrian and Trajan were born here. It was built because of the Rio Tinto mines : copper , zinc , silver and gold are still mined here. The amphitheatre, baths and some mosaics still exist, although the 1755 earthquake devastated much of Italica. Apparently one gladiator was paid the same as 100 soldiers!