Seville, A City We Loved And Hated

Well it’s a new year, in a manner of speaking (we left home 12 months ago) After a whole month of chilling in La Barrosa without writing blog posts every day it’s time to hit the road and hit the iPad again.

Our plan was to visit Seville for two days and catch the ferry to Morocco which would make four continents visited in one year. However, after arriving in Seville we decided that we loved the city and the little hotel we’re staying at. It’s a beautiful double room with a large balcony overlooking the courtyard and street. The hosts are a lovely couple who greet us by name whenever they see us. You can see their website here but we got a really good deal through bookings.com.

Well we’re not tick and flick travellers so achieving four continents wasn’t a big deal so after a chat we decided to extend the accommodation booking.

Michele has always been a big planner and not a spontaneous person Seville proved the need to plan even just a little. Spontaneity is great but you really need to do some planning or else it can cost time and money.

Many of the churches, cathedrals and museums throughout Seville and Spain are open on certain days with visits for free. Soon we were reminded that a bit of research can go a long way.

Firstly we discovered that the Cathedral was free on Mondays between 1600-1800. A snappy email was sent on Sunday but the reply came back midday Monday (in Spanish) So after translating the email, another email was sent and the reply came back ..sorry no room. If only we’d sent the email a week previously then we would’ve been assured of a place.

Secondly we were talked into a tourist bus tour of the city. Usually it’s something we steer clear of, but the hop on hop off tour sounded really great. The company proudly claimed they’d been running for 25 years and judging by their buses they’d been driving the same bus for the whole time. You can read about our experiences here If we’d done research we would’ve checked the reviews first before deciding on a company.

It was not all bad though, whilst in Seville we walked heaps of kilometres checking out different churches, museums, cafe’s, cervecerias and took in a flamenco show.
Seville turned into a city we both loved and hated.

Loved Plaza de Espana with it’s stunning tiled areas and beautiful water features.

Loved sitting by the river at the New York Bar soaking up the sun on their sun lounges whilst sipping on a cool drink.

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Loved the Pancho Walking Tour of the Legends of Seville, we can highly recommend their tours. You pay what you feel the tour is worth at the end so you do not feel you have overpaid.

We discovered these on the tour, the story of Susona a young Jewish girl who betrayed her family which lead to their deaths. On her death she asked for her severed head to be left above her house to remind others of the perils of her actions. You will need to do the tour to find out the other two 🙂

Loved that we were able to check out the Tower D’Or and its little maritime museum for free.

Loved the Iglesia De El Salvador and the fact the entry included the Cathedral and we could skip the line. We were not as fond of the Cathedral as it was like a museum and had no life in it.

Loved the centre of the city with its cathedral, churches, cafe’s and cervecerias but hated the edge of the central city which was seedy, dirty and covered with graffiti.

Loved the flamenco dancing and music, but hated the singing (it sounded like wailing).

We loved the Art Museum more for the building than the art but for 1.50 euros it is well worth a visit.

We also loved the museum that told the story of the Jews who lived in Seville but thought it was overpriced. We hated that we discovered you could attend their Flamenco Show for 18 Euros and get in for free….

While we have mixed feelings about our time here we are really glad we came and have no regrets.

Tomorrow we head to Morocco, Michele’s first time in Africa

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8 thoughts on “Seville, A City We Loved And Hated

  1. The title of the post made me curious. I came here to see why you hated Seville. 🙂
    To me, it’s a city I can not hate. It has so many things that I can spend at least a month to explore. Ah the smell of orange too!

    BTW, I watched the same people performing Flamenco dance. I was told, the wailing is depicting the pain of being in love. 🙂

    1. The strange thing is we did love it and would return…if that makes sense. That is interesting about the flamenco I wish they had explained that to us.

  2. I too was attracted by the title of this post. Our trip to Seville was on our first trip ever together in 1981. It was the week of Semana Santa (Easter week), so the place was buzzing and we were able to see the religious processions. We stayed at a guesthouse in the old Jewish quarter that is still the standard by which we measure the awfulness of accommodations. It looked very quaint from the outside, but was kind of bizarre on the inside. The sheets on our bed were actually cold and slimy (shudder). I also remember the smell of orange blossoms and the wailing of the Flamenco dancers/singers. I’d like to go back to Sevilla also and this time we would be able to afford a bed that wasn’t creepy.

    1. It sounds terrible Suzannne, I would love to be there for the festival one year and as I love orange blossom would be in heaven. Here’s to neither of us experiencing slimy sheets again

  3. Every time I reach Seville, I try to find time to visit at least a few Catholic churches because I like the silence inside and the people which can be found inside.

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