Carmona!

I realized that I completely forgot to mention the archivo de Indias in my last blog post. On Thursday my America and Spain class (the painfully boring one) took a trip to the Archivo de Indias in Sevilla. The building was constructed after the founding of the New World, and it was where merchants would gather to discuss and plan voyages to the New World and do trade. Sevilla was the main (and only) port where ships sailed to and from America in Spain. Now the building hosts the archives of the New World. I think the rest of my class was bored by a bunch of old documents and letters in glass displays that we saw, but it fascinated me. The archivo hosts the Treaty of Tordesillas, although we couldn't see it for some reason... apparently they're putting it out in the spring. There were also rows and rows of boxes full of letters, journals, papers, maps and other archives from the founding of the new world. I thought about how incredibly awesome it would be to do research with documents like that. Those types of things have fascinated me ever since I took my Interpreting the South through Manuscripts class freshman year, where we basically read letters from Civil War soldiers, plantation journals and diaries from women at the turn of the century and wrote papers about them. So incredible, I love it! The museum would have been better if I knew some more Spanish, though, and was actually able to read the documents.

Archivo General de Indias

Saturday, Alice and I took a day trip to Carmona. It was just the two of us because half of our group (including my roommate) went to Barcelona, and the other half was in Ronda, where I have already been. Carmona ended up being a wonderful little day trip, and the whole day only cost us about 9 euros!

On the bus on the way there we befriended another group of Americans who were studying abroad with IES, which brings together students from colleges all over the country. One of the guys from Texas had a host family of Mormons (Spanish Mormons? who knew such a thing existed?), which he said was horrible because they were trying to convert he and his roommate. He was catholic, and he said they blamed catholics for everything and would talk bad about them. He was in the process of getting his housing situation changed! We didn't stick with the group, but we ended up running into them nearly everywhere we went, and took the bus back with them too!

Our self-guided tour began at the Alcazar de la Puerta de Sevilla, which was the wall and gate of the old city. We were able to climb up onto the roof of the castle to see beautiful views. Carmona is a pueblo- blanco like Ronda. It has white houses with brown roofs (que hermosa!)

On the roof of the alcazar

Looking over the alcazar and the city

After the alcazar, we left our American friends and tried to find a convent. But we didn't have success-- it must have closed early for siesta. However, we did get stopped by this crazy old man in a wheelchair, who told Alice that she was beautiful because she was moreno (dark-headed) and that I was ugly because I didn't have dark hair. Yes, he was crazy, but not exactly a confidence-booster.

So instead we went to the Priorial de Santa Maria, the finest of Carmona's churches. Like every cathedral in Sevilla, it was built after the Christian reconquest in the 15th century on the site of the city's main mosque. It was also built in the style of Sevilla's cathedral, and it looked very similar.

My favorite part of the cathedral was the red and blue stained glass, that reflected on the walls and ceilings of the church, making it seem purple. So pretty!

After the cathedral and a lunch break to eat the bocadillos our señoras had packed for us, we headed to the outskirts of the city. We came to an overlook where you could see out into the landscape for miles. To make it even more perfect, horses grazed in the pastures below.



Then we went to the Alcazar del Rey Don Pedro, which was a 14th-century palace overlooking the plains, and is now a historic hotel. We ran into our American friends as we stood out on the balcony taking in the gorgeous views. I liked it because it was how I picture the alcazars looking back in the day. Since this one is one of the few still in use, it looked less like a ruin and more like a palace.

View from the balcony of the alcazar-hotel

The courtyard of the alcazar-hotel

We walked back through town and took a much needed stop at a little bakery for sweets/ coffee/ soda and a bathroom.


We headed to the old Roman ruins, but weren't able to visit because we didn't realized it had closed at 2. Although we did see a random amphitheater in the middle of a field.

Random remains of a Roman amphitheater in the middle of a field

All in all, a very successful little day trip. I had a lot of fun!