Eos Log
In our memory Seville stood out as one of the best Spanish city's but somehow we'd forgotten just how wonderful, beautiful, impressive, magnificent, splendid etc etc it was.
Hours and hours we spent rediscovering the wonderful streets and admiring the numerous large well kept buildings. Okay, there are loads and loads of tourist shops all selling the same romeria
dresses and bull T-shirts to the hordes of tourists, but it never felt too crowded and there were still many lovely streets without them. Anyway, sometimes it's just nice to be a tourist among
tourists and not to be standing out like one.
We had already visited several of the high lights, but we had omitted to attend a flamengo show in the Museo de Baile Flamenco. Well, next time we get to Seville we'll go and see a show again! In between enjoying the rapid foot work of the dancers I tried to take pictures, but their movements were just too fast.
The first couple of days were fairly hot with temps up to 37º, but the nights were not oppressively warm and there were hardly any mosquitos. And then it started to rain! Not just a shower, but three days of it and after that we had to jump puddles to cross the streets which had turned into rivers. We had known that being moored under the trees of the outer pontoon at Gelves we'd be clearing the deck of leaves until christmas, but we were not so pleased to find the stains the wet bark of the eucalyptus trees had left on deck. However, it wasn't dusty anymore, nor hot.
We tried to find out if we could take a bus or train to do a daytrip to Córdoba. After several internet hours we found out that the bus from Gelves does not stop at either the train station or the bus station in Seville and neither does the otherwise wonderful new metro system that runs into Seville from San Juan, the village next to Gelves. It would mean catching a bus from Gelves at around 7 o'clock and hope to find a bus or have to walk for about an hour to the bus station or train station, and all this before actually getting on a train or bus to Córdoba itself. So we gave up on that and decided to add Córdoba to the list of places we'll visit next time we sail along this coast.
Gelves itself is nothing special, but it is conveniently near Seville (20 minutes on the bus) and the marina is rather pleasant. We enjoyed the view of the bit of woodland on the island on the other side of the river where you can spot horses and sheep coming to the shore for a drink of water. There had been a nice community of liveaboards when we had been visiting before, but now, in the middle of summer, there was hardly anybody braving the August heat, but which turned out not so hot after all.
