“A city isn’t so unlike a person. They both have
the marks to show they have many stories to tell. They see many faces. They
tear things down and make new again.”
After a flight to Málaga and a quick lunch, our train to Sevilla made its way out of Estación Maria Zambrano. The three colours of the country west of Málaga slide past… olive and red ochre, the gentler blue of the Andalucía sky in October… cloudless today. The carriage is quiet, the mascarilla** challenges made and resolved by the renfe staff (other than 2 English women who appeared to be allowed to go unmasked for no good reason known to us) and most of us relaxed into the journey, masked and happy, anticipating the destination.
The more irregular and varied land before Cordoba gave way to that odd, seemingly derelict area on the edge of the city. Then the apartment blocks and concrete took over. These may not be architecturally attractive areas, but they are nonetheless living and breathing parts of a city with real beauty at its heart. Maybe next time we get off here.
The train pulls in the opposite direction out of Cordoba, peels to the south towards Sevilla. Estación Santa Justa welcomes us with hot sunshine, and a taxi driver who appeared to know where we were going before I’d finished mispronouncing the address.
The Resitur is an apartment building in the Triana neighbourhood of Sevilla, and our Airbnb was within. Our little studio apartment in this large block was clean enough, just about big enough, and perfectly located for this little adventure of ours.
Triana deserves further introduction, and I’ll paraphrase to some degree from a previous blog post. Triana was the original gitano neighborhood, separated from Sevilla until relatively recently (geographically and culturally?) and was a town apart in many ways. There seem to be a few uncomfortable grey areas around how los gitanos were “encouraged” to relocate, but Triana has retained plenty of the culture. More of this later, but you can see, hear and smell that culture should you dare to go 2, or 3, or 4, or 5 streets back into Triana and get a little immersed.
The Calle Betis riverfront, where Triana gazes across the Rio Grande*** at Paseo de Cristobal Colon, Plaza de Toros and the Torre del Oro is pleasant at any time of day. In the evening, the sun starts to sink behind Triana and throws amazing light on the Andalucian white and amber of those wonderfully conceived buildings****. The rowers and pleasure cruisers make their way up and down, and Sevillanos and visitors alike sit on the muelle, legs dangling over the water… simply because it’s a lovely place to be in the sunset.
Some of those bars and restaurants on that Calle Betis riverfront have become disappointing, and a little turistic. There is a delightful thing known as sitting together over a drink. One can talk, argue, laugh, people-watch, or just sit in silence if that is what’s comfortable. When you’re told that you can’t do this at a riverfront pavement café, because they only serve drinks with food after 8pm, this is beyond frustrating. I’m absolutely sure the very amiable young camarero didn’t relish telling us this, but it made our decision for us.
We crossed the elegant Puente de Triana and sought out drinks and dinner on the Sevilla side. After dinner, the early morning flight began to take its toll, and we headed back to Triana for much-needed sleep.
This visit to Sevilla became centered around 4 particular parts of town:
We had deliberately booked our accommodation in Triana after a brief taste of it in a previous visit. The Calle Betis waterfront has been mentioned already (and there are some worthy venues along there) but it’s essential to dig deeper.
The small area of Triana bordered by Calle Betis,
Calle San Jacinto, Calle Pagés del Corro and the wide Avenida de República
Argentina begs to be explored. It’s reminiscent of El Cabañal in Valencia… much
of it is a maze of small, old residential streets, some houses decorated with
remarkable ceramics inside and out. Small bars and restaurants are sometimes revealed
only as you pass. Tiny shops and venues for flamenco shows. The unmistakable
sounds of flamenco heard during the day from flamenco schools scattered around
the area. Indeed, you start to notice many places to learn. A painting school.
A yoga school. A ceramics school. More than any shiny new apartment block or
chain eatery, these are the places that make the area what it is.
Emerging eventually into the busy Calle Pagés del Corro and making our way towards our apartment building, you realise how much Triana has to offer, and how much we have yet to see.
For no tangible reason, we tended to be drawn back to the area around Puerta del Arenal when on the Sevilla side of the river. Calle García de Vinuesa meets Calle Arfe meets Calle Adriano meets Calle Antonia Diaz in a noisy clutter of bars, restaurants, hotels, cars and horse-drawn carriages full of tourists looking at their phones. Visitors get lost, scooters, cycles, motorbikes and waiters have better things to worry about, and there is so much life here that you could sit and watch for hours, immersed.
I suppose this part of the city kept us coming back because everything you need is within reach. It’s not too far away from the river and Triana, and the Cathedral and Santa Cruz sit there waiting in the other direction... more barrios beyond.
Parque de Maria Luisa and Jardines del Prado de San Sebastían:
Beyond the Universidad de Sevilla lie these 2 city parks. Parque Maria Luisa is a magnificent city park with the Plaza de América and its formal gardens at the southern end, acres and acres of shady walks with quirky corners, elegant memorials and tree-lined avenues… an oasis from the city’s clamour.
We were early one day for our intended destination in the Prado de San Sebastían, and we walked almost the full area of Parque Maria Luisa, determined as we were to discover the Sevilla beyond the obvious (and previously visited) attractions such as the Cathedral and the Alcázar. However delicious the park was in the sweet sunshine that followed a cloudy start to the day, the irresistible Plaza de España draws you back. Like the much more modest Plaza de América, Plaza de España was built in 1928 for the Ibero-American Exposition of 1929. In a way that may not seem immediately obvious, it brings to mind the futuristic City of Arts & Sciences in Valencia. What they have in common is that there are millions of photographs of both places in existence across the world, but seeing more and taking more photographs is irresistible. The Plaza de España is nothing short of astonishing, and we just keep going back.
We visited twice to see performances from dance schools and to eat in Greece, Mexico and Argentina, and to enjoy an unmissable drink in a very lively Cuba.
Can someone make this happen everywhere please?
I’ll never stand to look up at La Giralda without it moving me. The cathedral is obviously the tourist epicenter, surrounded by thousands of people and their phones, horses and carriages waiting to trot punters away on a paseo, turistic bars and restaurants leading away up Calle Mateos Gago… but it’s not realistic to think that you’ll visit Sevilla and not go to see that Cathedral up close.
This naturally takes you into the Juderia (hopefully via a chaotic caña and tapa at Bodega Las Columnas) and the narrow streets pull you in. At quiet times, it can be peaceful and full of charm. At busy times, the combination of packed tables outside small bars in narrow streets and thousands of shuffling visitors can grind everything to a halt.
Before the Dia de la Hispanidad on the 12th October, we punctuated our little Sevilla adventure with a trip to Cádiz on the train. Once clear of the residential area of Dos Hermanas, the agricultural land is largely already-harvested arable, as flat and wide as you can imagine. The eye could just make out hills on the very far horizon across the acres. Around Lebrija, gentle hills rolled, but the earth was the same dark chocolate where ploughed.
After Jerez de la Frontera, the track ran through eerie estuary marshland, seeming dark grey and a little hostile under heavy skies, despite the sight of flamingoes in the salt flats. Skeletons of long-abandoned boats poked from the mud, and I couldn’t resist childhood reminiscences of C. S. Lewis’ Narnia. Extracted salt was piled up in places, the water in the cloudy pools a coral pink.
After Puerto de Santa Maria, this gave way to a narrow beach backed by dunes that ran alongside the track and a busy road. We were soon on a causeway and into Cádiz.
Reaching unmistakably “old-town” architecture after
a while, we dropped into the square in front of the Cathedral, the default
refuge of the first-time visitor. The Cathedral is imposing, but far from an
architectural classic. The cafés in front of the Cathedral were as uninspiring as expected,
but we wanted the reward of a cold beer and the first part of lunch after our
long walk.
Mercado Central de Abastos is Spain’s oldest covered market. We will habitually visit the central market in every Spanish town or city (and even barrio) that we go to, so we’ve seen some great ones. Mercado Central de Valencia stands out, of course. The sights, sounds and smells of the Cádiz offering were remarkable. Every market in Spain has excellent seafood, but this was another level. All the usual suspects were there, but of the very highest quality. Here were huge fish of all kinds. There was shark, heads displayed alongside steaks. Swordfish displayed likewise. Enormous tuna laid on chopping blocks, matching the size of the stallholder trying to sell it.
For the second part of lunch, we enjoyed excellent salad with the best tuna Cádiz has to offer (for 5€, just FYI) amazing skewers of grilled prawns, and soft, moist dogfish.
There was a little rain, and a distant rumble of thunder. We were under cover, and finished our meal as the storm arrived, a crash of thunder directly overhead getting everyone’s attention. I went inside and waited for the single, tiny, windowless bathroom behind an elderly gent who was waiting for his wife to finish in there. He straightened a couple of the bullfighting pictures on the wall. As we chuckled over this, another guy joined us in the little queue, along with a disabled teenager and his carer.
As the rain slowed, we left the locals getting ever more noisy and comfortable in the bar, and splashed away from the market towards the sea again, wanting to make the coastal circuit around the north end of the city peninsula. We passed a colony of feral cats, shelters and food apparently provided by a local charity. There’s a small beach at the start of a short causeway leading to the Castillo de San Sebastian, there’s an extraordinary beach pavilion that currently houses the headquarters of the Underwater Archaeology Centre.
Before the next fortification, Castillo de Santa Catalina with it’s fishing harbor alongside, there was evidence of decay in buildings new and old. A large building behind the beach pavilion was beautiful in a neglected kind of a way. More modern buildings showed similar signs of neglect, but then a startling juxtaposition appeared in the form of a shiny new apartment complex next to pretty gardens, opposite University buildings.
We walked on, following the coast toward the port area, and ducked back into the old town for a drink before our return journey. Our taxi arrived at the station in 5 quick minutes, and it’s here you realize that your train does not leave from the same station that it arrived at. There appears to be more than 1 station in Cádiz (actually 3 I think). It also left from platform 6, despite every screen in the station saying platform 1. We were kind of lucky to get on it, to be fair. Nobody said it was going to be simple.
The train back to Sevilla followed a slightly different route, dropping travellers at Jerez airport this time. A passenger behind me rustled and fidgeted and started crunching crisps. Inexplicably, he moved seats to sit in front of me, and I was able to observe that the packet of crisps that he was crunching and chewing his way through was around the size of Wales. The crunching and the chewing continued unabated for what seemed like hours, until he did that ghastly “pour the last of the crisps down my throat” thing.
No matter, there would be no more crunching.
Until he reached back into his carrier bag, and produced a large tube of Pringles. I have fairly serious issues with Pringles. He will never know how close he was to being executed just at that moment, as he began to crunch again. Mercifully, he couldn’t manage more than about a quarter of the tube. A young Spanish girl got on the train and sat next to him, and he put them away and chose to behave.
You’ll be delighted to know that I’ve put all of this behind me now.
Back in Sevilla, one realizes how important some things are to the city. Food is one, flamenco another.
It’s very easy to find good food in Sevilla. The usual gastronomical nasties are there, of course. Use the big brand fast foods if you must, it’s not a crime. But it’s likely that 2 minutes away is a small place with great anchoas, then another with great ensaladilla, then another with buñuelos de bacalao that you’d cross the city for. In just a couple of visits, we’ve got ourselves a few favourite venues already, and we try to do the tapeo thing… one or two tapas here, one or two at the next place, and so on.
With the smallest dose of education (and that’s really all we have) you can try to pair drinks with food to make it all work a little better. Manzanilla might work nicely with charcutería, or even with that amazing duck pate in La Antigua Abaceria in Triana*****. A cold beer might work well with shrimp. Your carillada de cerdo might like a drop of red to cosy up to.
Shun the tourist habit of grabbing a table outside. Go and stand at the bar. Near to where the camameros pick up the orders and interact with the guys behind the bar, the guys that slice the jamon and dish out the habas. We enjoyed another lunch (part two) in Café Bar Las Teresas in Santa Cruz. Our cañas were crashed down on the bar in front of us. Boquerones were crashed down equally firmly, the cost so far chalked on the bar top. Camareros crashed plates and glasses down. Plates of jamon iberico were crashed down in front of locals sharing their lunch. They in turn crashed their glasses down as one reached the end of another story.
As we enjoyed a little grilled entrecote de buey, tiny young woman walked into the bar and shouted “A MENU IN ENGLISH PLEASE!” at the top of her voice. The clamour ceased for a second, everyone laughed, and she succeded in getting her menu. She now had the waiter’s attention for her visit. We silently admired her endeavor, and that of any young woman travelling alone and prepared to be strident enough to get what they want and enjoy it.
Over our 2 visits to Sevila to date, what we have been surprised at is how strong the flamenco tradition is. Sevillanos of all ages are engaged in it. One might expect the younger generation to shun traditions such as this, but this doesn’t seem to be the case. A couple of young waiters might practice palmas in a break from their work. Lots of young people seem to listen to flamenco music habitually, and the prevalence of flamenco shows away from tourist areas, and flamenco schools tell us that this art form is in a healthy state.
Other than the general background of flamenco that you’ll experience in many parts of the city, we had a few more direct experiences of flamenco on this visit, that come under their own sub-headings, going from bad to good:
Appalling:
The lady in the cathedral square in Cádiz gets 1 out of 10 for getting out there and trying. Although I was trying to tune her out, I think she did announce at one point that flamenco was what she was doing, but it was in name only.
Endearing:
A small group performing outside the Banco de España appeared (to our untrained eyes and ears) to be performing realtively accomplished, happy, graceful, tuneful and endearing flamenco for a little cash. It’s so hard to know how good flamenco is when you’re as inexperienced as we are, so I guess you have to go with your feelings.
The second performance was special. The centre of the great pavilion of the Plaza de España was busy, and the performers were taking a break when we arrived. The group soon came to life. The male singer’s performance became intense and impressive, and one, two and quickly three female dancers were performing in mesmeric semi-coordination (to be perfectly coordinated would unbearably un-Spanish) in the shadows under the astonishing edifice, the diffused intensity of the light in the plaza playing a perfect role as their backdrop.
As with our previous visit, we felt that we’d seen authentic flamenco here. No need for a staged tablao for us. I could make that walk past the University, over the busy city roads and into that park every day.
And so back to Málaga.
The train from Sevilla followed the same southerly direction as it had a few days previously, on that Cádiz trip. After a time, it wheeled away to the east, and the land returned to that olive, ochre and blue that announced your approach to the Málaga region once again. The train entered more and more tunnels, and in between, you could see the magnificent mountains and gorges approaching El Chorro. This where the precarious Caminito del Rey attracts that variety of hiker/walker that has a little of the thrill-seeker in them… attracted to the precarious walkways and rope bridges of the caminito. A few passengers with enormous backpacks climbed on, and we pressed on to Málaga, through valleys a little more gentle, and attractive villages adjoining deserted olive processing factories.
Back in Málaga. It feels like a comfortable old pair of shoes now, particularly in the benign Autumn weather. The young man who welcomed us into our small hotel close to Mercado de Atarazanas couldn’t have been more friendly, and after exchanging some rather random Spanglish, we dropped bags and pushed out into the city for food.
The whole area of Pergolas de la Victoria, El Palmeral de las Sorpresas, and Muelle Uno are still getting better. Muelle Uno’s apparent efforts to attract the superyacht market appear to be succeeding, and it seems smart, but not in a Puerto Banus kind of a way. Walking the length of Muelle Uno to the lighthouse and crossing the road, we take the beachside Paseo de Matías Prats, past the ever-present guys playing dominoes, past the beach bars, along Playa la Malagueta, then cutting back towards Centre Pompidou Málaga.
We arrived late (even for a Spanish lunch) and as we waited at the bar, the waiter suggested that we’d need to cross our fingers for a table in the dappled sunshine next to the Cathedral gardens. The kitchen was ready to close.
But we glared from the doorway at a couple dithering over their coffee, and this seemed to do the trick. The waiter had clearly had enough for the day, and mumbled to us “like a good waiter, I must clean this table once again” but it was gentle sarcasm, and he served us amiably. I wanted to order pork shoulder to go with ensalsda and really good chicken croquetas, but he insisted that the rabo de toro was a better choice. He was correct of course, and the half-consumed salad was relegated to the far corner of the table, accepting its defeat.
The re-opened KGB was a revelation that evening. Down a tiny side street close to the Cathedral, you have a new, shiny, stainless steel, bright bar with the “old tapas bar” system. Find your little piece of real estate if you can, then shout up what you want. They start a cuenta in your name, and you go from there. The food is amazing, the customers are of all ages, and feel of the place is good. Málaga once again, regenerating.
Train back to the airport.
Those 3 cities though. So much to give, so much character, so much personality, so much soul.
I long for Valencia as life’s ups and downs pass by. Tenants in the apartment are unpredictable amd inconsistent in their plans and pressures, but I’ve made point of blocking out 2 weeks in March 2023 for us.
And that means Fallas everyone. It will happen.
*
We didn’t visit Valencias on this trip, as the changing plans of tenants
continue to prevent this. We’re preparing ourselves for Fallas 2023.
** Masks were still mandatory on all public transport in Spain at the
time of our visit. There is general compliance with this, and little complaint.
Those who seem so vehemently opposed to this in the UK may have issues with
this, but we don’t.
*** The Rio Guadalquivir is the only major navigable river in Spain. Los
Sevillanos are known to refer to it as the Rio Grande, in recognition of the
part it has played in the history of Spain and the "new world".
**** Apart from Teatro de la Maestranza. A monstrosity.
***** I’m a little scared to say this, but that paté might be a rival to the
one that La Senia in Valencia serve up. You know, the one that makes you think
it must be made of something illegal or unworldly, as it tastes unfeasibly
good.
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