SEVILLA, SPAIN

There’s nothing better than traveling in Spain…except when it’s with your family!! During the time that the Montagnets were visiting, they took two day trips—El Escorial and Toledo—and had a short stay in Sevilla. I’ll write about day trips outside of Madrid shortly, but today I want to focus on our quick, 36-hour visit to Seville.

 

Below consists of a narrative of our trip with helpful links and bullet points at the bottom!

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It was so nice having my family come visit me in Madrid. Sadly, my sister and her husband couldn’t come, but my mom and dad and Elliott (little brother) arrived on March 10^th and stayed until March 19^th. Because I had a test the day that we were going to leave for Seville, we had to catch the 5:00 PM train out of the Madrid Atocha station. We arrived at the station and were through security about 20 minutes before the train was scheduled to depart. However, the station had not assigned a platform for the train just yet, and we were waiting for quite some time to see when there would be an update. Finally, around 5:10 PM, we were given a platform, and everyone flooded to get their tickets checked. We made it on the train and we were en-route to Seville as soon as the last person’s ticket was scanned. Because I enjoyed our botellon on the train ride to Logrono, I decided to do the same with my parents. We had a nice, relaxing train ride through the countryside of Spain with a bottle of Albarino and Spanish manchego cheese. Elliott journaled while I worked on homework, and when we were both done, we watched Megamind together for the last half of the trip (lol).

We arrived in Seville in about 2.5 hours and walked outside towards the taxi line (side note: for all my Kansas City people, the Seville train station has an exit called Kansas City). A lot of the residential streets in Seville cannot be reached by car, so don’t be confused if a taxi or Uber drops you off a little further away from your destination than you expected. We grabbed our bags and made our way to the Airbnb, where the host was waiting on us to give us a tour of the place and a low-down on all things Seville. We had a wonderful set up—close to the Cathedral, Alcazar, great shopping, yummy restaurants, and only a 25-minute walk from the river (I’ll link where we stayed at the bottom of the page). Jose was a fantastic host and left us with a binder of all his recommendations and helpful hints. It was around 9:00 PM when we got settled, and we were half-hungry from the snacks on the train. We stopped by Burger King to grab Elliott some chicken nuggets then made our way to one of Jose’s favorite restaurants. On our way, we were amazed by how incredible Seville smells due to its orange trees—truly heavenly! Sadly, we were turned away from the restaurant since it was fully booked for the night and settled for a quaint tapas restaurant just around the corner. It was delicious and just what we needed! Since it was drizzling, we sat under an umbrella outside and shared a small plate of risotto, some chicken skewers, croquettes, and a bottle of wine. After dinner we strolled back home, showered, and made a game plan for our day ahead.
 

The next morning, we were ready for the day, munching on pastries and coffee by 10:15 AM. Our first stop of the day was the Catedral de Sevilla (*NOTE: in order to gain access to the cathedral, you MUST purchase your tickets ahead of time – no walk-ins allowed!). After our short 10-minute walk, we found ourselves looking up at the stunning Cathedral. Depending on where you are coming from, odds are that you will not walk up to the entrance point of the church. We were very confused because there was a long line of people on one side of the church, however, there was a very unclear sign that seemed to be telling us to keep walking to the real entrance point. I went to investigate, and sure enough, the real entrance was just around the corner (*the first place we went to was the entrance to climb up to the top of the cathedral). After our little set-back, we were a few minutes late to our 10:45 appointment. I was nervous that they would not let us in, but to my surprise, we walked in without a problem. There was a 5-euro audio-guide tour and we opted-in—and I am so glad that we did! The Cathedral is HUGE so having the audio tour point out the highlights and give some history was extremely helpful. The Cathedral contains incredible art pieces and is known to be the 3^rd most important “museum” in Spain (behind the Prado and the Seville Museum of Fine Arts). It also has the tomb of Christopher Columbus and contains a thorn from Jesus’s crown of thorns. After admiring the beauty and history of the church for nearly 2 hours, we had to leave in order to make it to our next tour at the Alcazar. When you exit the Cathedral, there is a pizza-by-the-slice spot as soon as you leave. We stopped here, grabbed a slice, and ate it very quickly in order to meet our tour guide at 12:50 outside of the Alcazar (which is just a 4 minute walk from the Cathedral).

Thorn from Jesus' Crown of Thorns

Christopher Columbus's tomb

If you read by post on Granada and thought that the Alhambra looked interesting, the Alcazar was extremely similar. In fact, King Peter I, who built the Alcazar, asked the ruler of Granada to send him some of his enslaved Moorish builders that were constructing the Alhambra during the same time. As for the tour of the Alcazar, we booked one that was guided through the company Sevilla Walking Tours just a couple of days before we went to Seville; our guide was very informative, and it was easier to stay engaged in a small group with a real tour guide. We learned about the artwork, Christopher Columbus, King Peter I and his ruthless reign, Queen Isabella and King Ferdinand’s family, and perhaps my favorite part…we learned about Game of Thrones! If you have ever watched GOT before, you may remember the kingdom of Dorne. In case you don’t recall, this is where Jaime Lannister visits his daughter in season five. HBO decided to film many of the scenes from Dorne right in the Alcazar—and it was still open to the public while they were filming! I’ll put a few pictures below that compare the scenes in Game of Thrones to what we saw on our tour. If you have ever been a Game of Thrones fan, I would highly recommend getting this add-on to your Alcazar tour!

Game of Thrones Comparisons:

*I can't find a picture to compliment this but this was also a spot in GOT

After following around the peacocks of the Alcazar and exploring the gardens a little bit longer, we decided to go to the Hotel Alfonso XIII for an afternoon drink (the Game of Thrones cast stayed here). We sipped on a glass of French Chardonnay and enjoyed the warm weather on their outdoor porch. It was around 4:00 when we finished our drinks and began making our way back to our Airbnb. My mom and I did a little bit of shopping before going back, then quickly primped ourselves for our Guadalquivir river cruise. Once we were ready, I called an Uber to take us to the meeting point set by the company. The information on the tickets for the boat cruise did not indicate the need to get to the boat before the departure time (6:00 PM for us). However, once we were in our Uber, I received a call from the company. They asked us if we were close to the harbor, even though it was 10 minutes before the time listed on the ticket. Our Uber had us scheduled to arrive at 6:02 PM, which I assumed would be fine, but apparently it was not. I explained the situation and the lady told me that they could only wait a for a few more minutes…even though this was a “private” boat tour. Thankfully, we got to the dock and the boat had not left yet. We climbed aboard, took a tour of the boat, then settled on the top deck to get the best view of Seville. The boat tour included a drink, cheese and meat board, and a guide that pointed out and explained the history of the landmarks that could be seen from the river. The food and drink was great—my mom and I tried a traditional drink of Seville—7Up mixed with white wine—and my dad got a nice glass of red. The staff was very friendly and were welcoming to Elliott (he even go to drive the boat) However, looking back on the tour, I’m not exactly sure that I would do it again (I would rate it a 5.5/10). Here’s why: 1) I don’t think Sevilla has its most beautiful views on the river 2) the tour guide wasn’t extremely knowledgeable 3) our tour was supposed to be private, there was another couple on board that had missed their boat-time earlier that day (seems like there’s a lack of communication on when people should arrive at the dock). Don’t get me wrong, we had a great time, but I am sure that there could be better cruises than the one we booked (I’ll link this specific one at the bottom of the page). 

 

Once we arrived back to the dock, we said our goodbyes to the crew members and started our sunset-walk along the river to our dinner reservation. The river is truly magnificent when the sun is going down; I would highly suggest making this a priority if you are ever in Seville. We arrived to our 8:00 reservation at Mariatrifulca a little bit early, so we waited upstairs in the bar area for a few minutes. Once the downstairs dining area was ready, we were brought down and given a table with a wonderful view of the city and the river. The ambiance and the wine were incredible, but I’m not sure that we made the best food choices. We made the mistake of not getting seafood at a seafood restaurant; if you go, definitely try their fish, I’m sure it is delicious! Regardless, we had a lovely evening with each other after an incredible day in Seville. After dinner, we walked outside the restaurant, hopped in a cab, and stopped at McDonald’s to get Elliott some chicken nuggets…and maybe some McFlurries for my mom and me. After our treat we walked back to the Airbnb, said our goodnights, and had a good night’s rest after our full day.

The next morning we were all a little tired, so we slept until around 10:00, quickly got ready, then packed our bags and left them at the front door. Jose was kind enough to let us leave our bags while the Airbnb was being cleaned for the next guests—another reason for you to stay here! Once we were ready to go, our first stop for day two was the bullfighting museum which was about a 20-minute walk from where we were staying. Once we arrived, we were a bit confused about the entrance to the museum. There was one long line filled with middle aged to old men—we figured out that this was the line to purchase tickets for the bullfights. If you continue to walk to the left of that line, you will see a smaller entrance; this is the line for the museum. You can purchase tickets individually, however, if you come with a family, they have a 25-euro special for families of all sizes (which was the cheaper option even for our family of four). Once we had our tickets, a lady stopped us and was holding a sign with three QR codes. These were the audio guides! Scan the code in English and you can follow along the tour with your phone. I highly suggest bringing Airpods or headphones during this tour—thankfully, I had mine in my purse by chance. This made the tour much more enjoyable as I didn’t have to hold the speaker of my phone to my ear the entire time. As for the museum itself—please do not think that I am an animal killer—it was one of my favorite parts of our trip! I found to fascinating to learn about the rich history that bullfighting has provided in Spain, and the audio guide does a fantastic job of using great imagery and music to make the tour more appealing and fun to listen to. 

When we were at the end of our tour (which finishes outside at the bullring) we heard massive amounts of incessant honking coming from the street next to the museum. When we walked out, I was shocked by what was filling the streets—countless 18-wheeler trucks (but without cargo trailers) that went on for miles. If you think you have seen a labor strike in the US, just wait until Europe—they take it seriously. After that occurrence, we started to make our way back to our side of town. My mom and I stopped in a few stores that caught our eye while my dad was figuring out what looked good for lunch. We decided on an early lunch (around 1 PM) in a plaza on the outside of Seville’s most famous flamenco store—Flamenco Y Mas. Once my mom and I finished our food, we left the boys at the table and went inside the store to pick out which dress we would wear if we were a flamenco dancer. Part of me wants to get one before I leave Spain so I can have an authentic Halloween costume…I’m not so sure that my luggage space can validate that decision though. After lunch, the girls and boys split off—girls got gelato, explored, and shopped, while the boys found Elliott some kid-friendly food and churros. By the time we met up again, we were ready to grab our bags and call an Uber to the train station. We arrived at the station around 3:15 for our 3:45 departure, grabbed a coffee, and made our way to the platform with no rush. Elliott and I watched Shark Tale together and before we knew it, we were already back in Madrid.

 

Seville was a perfect place to show my parents more of Spain. I would recommend going for three nights if you can, as we could have used an extra day to explore a bit more. All in all, if you ever find yourself in Spain, I would make it a priority to go anywhere in Andalucia (Granada, Seville, Cordoba) in order to get a glimpse of the southern region.

 

Happy travels!!! Thank you for reading…a post on Paris is coming soon!

 

<3,
Mary Price

Our Trip in a List:

• Catedral de Sevilla (buy tickets ahead of time)
• Alcazar tour with Game of Thrones Extension
• Guadalquivir boat cruise
• Mariatrifulca (dinner; get reservation)
• Bullfighting museum
• Flamenca Y Mas (flamenco dress store)

Helpful Links:

• Tickets for the Cathedral of Seville (required to purchase before a visit)
• https://shop.articketing.com/catedral-de-sevilla
• Guided tour of the Alcazar (can add-on Game of Thrones Extension)
• https://sevillawalkingtours.com/product/alcazar-tour-tickets-included/
• Our boat tour (I wouldn’t necessarily recommend booking this one):
• https://www.tripadvisor.com/AttractionProductReview-g187443-d15000930-Cruise_on_an_exclusive_yacht_through_the_Guadalquivir-Seville_Province_of_Seville_.html

 

If We Had More Time We Would…

• Go to Plaza de Espana
• Walk up to the top of the cathedral to view Seville
• See a Flamenco Show
• Tour the flamenco museum
• If available, tour the school of flamenco
• Take a workout class at one of the “boxcar” gyms on the side of the river