Seville was the site of the 1929 Iberian-American exposition, and as such, plenty of countries from the Americas and those on the Iberian peninsula constructed exhibition buildings to highlight their national points of pride and their cultures. Those buildings still stand. We took a loop around the city a few times on the bus tour, landing eventually at the pavilion building for Spain. It had been there since 1929, as have all of the exhibition buildings, but the Spanish building was the backdrop for a few movie scenes. Notably, Lawrence of Arabia had a moment where Peter O’Toole walked down a grand staircase in the pavilllion, and some Star Wars movie from the second set of movies used the whole place and its extensive courtyard space as a royal palace. Frankly, of the three sets of Star Wars movies so far, I had very little interest in the second set. Cas had seen the film in question, of course, and he had played a video game that took place in that space. He pointed at a staircase and noted that R2-D2 really struggled with the steps in the movie.
Either way, it was a beautiful building. The scenery was lovely and somehow, a woman was using a large-scale bubble-blowing mechanism, so the whole place had big soap bubbles all around, which kids were chasing. For a moment, Cas was chasing them, too.
After we left the Plaza de Espana, we went to the neighborhood where the Gothic Seville Cathedral is located. The cathedral is about what I have come to expect. Having been raised by pragmatic Minnesota Lutherans, I often marvel at the decorative elements in cathedrals, and this one was not any different in that regard. Evidently, the Seville Cathedral is the third largest church in the world, according to our tour guide. The Internet has a few different ideas about which churches are bigger and which ones are smaller smaller. Evidently, church size is up for discussion. Still, it was beautiful, and to be sure, we took plenty of photos. After the Cathedral tour, Cas and I had a particularly leisurely lunch. We sat at a table in a sidewalk cafe for a whole meal, then shared a glass of Sangria after the meal was over. The people watching was just that good.
After we got back to the hotel, we relaxed a bit and got ready for our evening activities. We did that by locating, purchasing and consuming a bottle of delicious Spanish red wine. Having accomplished that, we were ready for the Flamenco show. Cas and I were both impressed by the highly skilled dancers, though we were both more impressed by the guitar player. Cas and I have both seen Eddie Van Halen in concert, and while Cas says that the guitar player this evening was no Eddie Van Halen, the two of them could have a meaningful conversation. Either way, the dancing was interesting and the music was spectacular.
The show actually wrapped up at 8 pm, and we had dinner afterward. It seems strange to think about that from an American perspective, but the sun didn’t even think about diminishing until 9 pm, only to actually take the plunge at 9:30. No wonder why Spaniards have a late dinner.
Tomorrow will start here and head to Costa Del Sol by way of Ronda. Should be a good one. We need to get to sleep so we can be up in time for all of that. Buenas Noches!
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