Friday

Friday was good. I had managed to see most everything that I had wanted to see so I had some time to relax before heading out to Granada.

I rented myself a little bicycle and spent most of the morning riding around the park and town. In the afternoon I went back to garden at the Alacazar because I had somehow missed them on my first tour of the place. I spent a considerable amount of time walking around these magnificent gardens and just getting lost in them. The gardens have peacocks, so naturally I went hunting for peacocks. Not literally, but I definitely wanted a picture of the peacocks. It took me a while to come across some. I tried chasing them to see if they would spread their beautiful wings, but nothing worked. I tried flapping my arms, running quickly over to them and stopping, jumping in their vicinity, but nothing worked. Dumb birds. The only shots I got were of them eating. Not very exciting.

I then ventured over the the Archives of India. I liked that a) it's free and b) not across town. I was very very impressed. The Archives are housed in this beautiful government building and include the original works of some of the most important Spanish explorers. It had original maps from the explorations into North America. Spain conquered quiet alot, and the vast amount of historical documents were impressive. They even had an old map of Texas! Oh how I miss home. The entire archives were really impressive and by far had some of the most interesting documents that I had seen in an exhibition. Right as I was leaving, a group of Spanish school children were coming in. They were about 6 or 7 and looked giddy to be out of class. I'm always a little jealous of the Europeans on how lucky they are to have history literally around the corner from them. These kids get to read about Cortez and then get to take a field trip to see his letters to the King and the hand drawn maps of the new world. Amazing.

I sat in a plaza for a while and just took in the atmosphere of the place. I have loved my time in Seville. It's a vibrant small city that is truly unique. I walked back slowly over the river and noticed the dark clouds above. Great, more rain. I hurried to the market to pick up some dinner and snacks and as I was leaving the market the skies opened up. Thankfully, the market and the hostel were about 5 minutes apart or I would have been drenched. Made some dinner with some friends and packed up for the night.

As I write this I'm about to head out to Granada. The train ride is about 3 hours or so and my cab is due in a few minutes. I'll post an update on Granada when I get settled in.