Sevilla -> Cordoba -> Granada

Spent quite a bit of time on buses the past couple of days. When last I left you, I was raving about how fantastic a town Seville is. I stand firmly by that conviction. The flamenco show Saturday night was really enrapturing. The guitarists, vocalists and dancers were all really top notch. A picture or two can be found below. If I do the fantasy football draft tomorrow evening, I may try to find a way to post a video segment between picks.

After the show, I decided to scope out a new district of the town, and found my way to a very active strip of bars and clubs on the far bank of the Rio Guadalquivir. While barhopping there, I overheard a couple of young women discussing, in English, the pronunciation of 'Willamette'. It didn't register at first, but moments later I wandered back and interrupted their conversation. Turns out, there was a crowd of a hundred or so American college students all about to start a semester abroad. A bunch of the girls were from Oregon, and I also met folks from Saratoga, Buffalo and Rotterdam. Small, small world. I hung out with this crowd until the small hours of the morning, slept in on Sunday, and made my way to the bus to Cordoba.

Cordoba was a nice town, although very small, very quaint and very much not open on a Sunday night and Monday morning. The Mezquita was open this morning, and that’s really why I went anyway. Seeing as I was only in town for about 19 hours, and was a bit hung over most of the time, it wasn’t much of a problem.

I did have my first real sit down fancy meal of the trip so far: Cordoban salmorejo (a super thick gazpacho), Cordoban churrasco (barbecued pork with a crazy Arabian garlic and chili sauce) and a half carafe of Montilla. This will probably be one of only a few top end meals worthy of photographing that you’ll get this trip. Europe is not cheap right about now, and I will probably mostly eat tapas at various bodegas. Tonight’s dinner here in Granada was tapas and a walking falafel.

Granada’s a pretty cool town so far. Apparently has a huge college population. My hotel’s adjacent to the University, about 15 minutes walk from most of the attractions. Took a long stroll upon arriving in town and it’s quite beautiful. Tomorrow morning’s the Alhambra, then probably a bit more of a walking tour, dinner and a few cervacas before the draft. I think I’ll probably try to do as much site-seeing as possible tomorrow, and stay out way to late again. It looks like this town has a pretty hopping social environment, but like all of Spain, it doesn’t really get going until after 1.