Exploring Alone

Day 48
Cordoba´s main attraction and the reason I was up early is the Mosque. When the Moors controlled this part of Spain they built a huge mosque here. After they had been expelled the building was refitted to function as a cathedral. If you showed up at 8:30 am you could get in for free. Always looking to save a buck I knew that this was for me. Unfortunately Al was not feeling well and he decided to stay in bed. So I was, once again, on my own.

The structure itself is absolutely amazing, more so than any of the chapels. A countless number of columns were set about 10 feet apart in perfect rows. The columns were white marble with red checked arches connecting them. I wanted Al to be able to see it so I took pictures of everything. Every chapel and probably every column. Despite the free entry the place was almost empty and I counted myself as lucky to have such an amazing place to myself. The whole thing is basically one giant stunning room.

On the way back to the hotel I picked up breakfast for the two of us and hopped that Al would be feeling better. We had a train that night and wouldn´t have a place for him to sleep if he was sick. Al still wasn’t doing well so I helped him pack up and then we found a shady bench in a nearby plaza for him to rest in. He told me to go ahead and explore, so I left him promising to come back quickly.

Before hitting the next site I stopped for a quick lunch at Duffin Dagles, it looked like Dunkin Donutes and tasked like it, but it wasn’t it. Odd. I then went to explore Cordoba´s Alcazar. This wasn´t nearly as interesting as the one in Seville had been. In fact, I would recommend skipping out on it. The gardens were nice, but I’m not a real garden person. There wasn´t much open on the inside of the building to check out. This Alcazar was where King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella made the decision to finance Christopher Columbus’s exploration of the new world. There was statue dedicated to the moment.

When I returned Al still wasn´t feeling better, but with me there to keep watch he was able to take a bit of a nap while I wrote in my journal. Eventually we ended up walking over to the mall where he decided to see a movie and I headed off to an internet café to try and catch up on my blog work.

I had a bit of a heart attack because I thought that I had lost my jacket. It would be cold later and there would be no time to get a new one, if I could even find one I liked. It turned out that I had dropped it on the floor and the guy at the internet café had picked it up.

Al and I met up in time to grab our stuff and head to the train station. Still not feeling well and in desperate need of some sleep Al decided to upgrade us to a couchette compartment on the train. We both fell asleep to the rocking of the train.

The Cordoba Code

Day 47
We had checked out and were up early to catch the 8 am bus to Seville, and then on to Cordoba. The bus that turned up was broken and we had to spend some time waiting for a replacement. While we waited we chatted with 3 American girls who were teaching English in different towns. Talking to them took up the entire 3 hour trip to Seville and made the trip a lot more fun.

After a quick lunch we were on the next bus to Cordoba. Most of everything was closed due to the time and because it was Monday. Still, there was plenty of daylight left so we decided to do the quiz that the tourist office had. Basically we were each given a sheet with 6 questions. We would need to follow the clues around the city to answer each of them.

We mapped out our route and were off. It wasn´t long before we had stopped for a churros with chocolate break. In Tarifa I had managed to trip over something and twist my left leg. I think it was worse than it would have been because I was carrying my pack at the time and the added weight nearly caused me to fall. It hurt, but I was ok walking around. While we were looking for one of the answers I managed to walk into a pole, hitting the same leg for a second time. Al took a picture of the pole.

The clues lead us through parts of Cordoba that we would have never seen. We passed cute little squares and churches with little tourist interest. We found frescos that we would have never even noticed if we hadn´t been looking for them. My favorite was a small courtyard with a statue of a matador in it. We managed to answer all of the questions but one. It was about what type of tree was in the courtyard of an old palace. We didn’t have access to the courtyard and no one we asked seemed to know.

After dinner of pork chops, Al wasn’t feeling so great so we decided to call it a night. I was pretty tired myself. We had been traveling at breakneck speed and I think it was catching up to both of us.