Ice Ice Baby (Seville - Carmona - Écija -Córdoba)

And sadly, dear reader, that brings an end to our time in Seville. It's interesting how your arrival can set the tone for the coming days. The drive in was relatively easy, there was a car spot out the front of the hotel, the car park (expensive) but the spaces were large and we liked Seville from the first instant. 

After breakfast, we were driving to Córdoba via two smaller towns, Carmona and Écija. There was no real reason to stop at either town except to break up the trip. Carmona was about a 30 minute drive from Seville and we found a street parking spot relatively easily. 

The entrance to the Carmona old town.

Like so many of the other towns, it had an old town area protected by walls or a fortress dating back to Roman times. It also had many churches, curiously, none of which was open to the public. As we walked towards the high walls, we observed two men in fluro vests, leaning up against cars that were parked right next to old town. Jayne had read about them prior to our visit. The car parking is actually free but the town apparently ratifies these two charging visitors €1. If they pay up, fine, if they don't, it appears nothing happens to your car but we were happy to walk for 5 minutes to avoid the entrepreneurs.

Another church.

We wandered the narrow streets, alerted to approaching cars by the squeal of rubber on limestone. It was a public holiday today, in lieu of yesterday and the main square was beginning to fill up with locals enjoying their day off work.

The walls above a café.

As we left to go back to our car, I attempted to take some final photos of yet another church across the main intersection, outside the walled old town. It took a good 10 minutes to take one shot free of traffic as every car within miles of Carmona seemed to converge at this roundabout. It was actually busier than the traffic in Seville as we departed the city earlier in the morning.

Worth the wait.

The next stop, Écija, was about 45 minutes drive. Somewhere along the A4 we could see a brilliant light that seemed to get brighter as we came closer. The light was so intense you could see dust particles and the rays of light themselves. Apparently it is a solar tower and is able to generate sufficient electricity to power all of Seville's homes. Sorry there are no pictures, but if you are interested you can read more about it here.

The palace wall in Écija.

Écija is known as the town of towers and that comes as no surprise as you drive down toward the town from the A4. Once again street parking was simple and we programmed the map to set off for the palace in the old town.

One of the many towers.

The old town was like every other, narrow limestone roads, narrow footpaths (if they existed), churches and cafés. It was even quieter here than Carmona and all the action seemed to be focussed on the new town. We walked around and snapped a few photos, marvelled at all the churches with doors firmly closed, found a palacio with decorative walls and then made a bee-line back to the car. Well, as much as that was possible.

A distant tower.

Back in the car, we put the hotel address into Apple maps, my preference because it provides more detail as you drive. Arriving in Córdoba was quite straight forward and I followed the instructions until I was taken off piste into the old town and told we had to park and walk the remainder of the distance to the hotel. We knew this was not correct.

We reprogrammed the address and were taken god knows where, down tiny little streets that couldn't fit a car and a pedestrian. "You have arrived," came the announcement, but clearly we hadn't. No hotel in sight. Another fruitless drive and eventually we found somewhere to pull over and swapped maps to Google. Off we went again.

At this point I was unsure if we'd travelled these same streets but I was hellbent on following Jayne's instructions as I tried to avoid pedestrians, motorbikes and cars. Turn right came the instruction, but I was not able to comply which meant being rerouted and driving away from what possibly could have been our hotel.

As we neared the missed turn for the second time, we had been driving around Córdoba for almost 30 minutes. We screeched down one last street and saw the name of the hotel. Jayne went inside to enquire about parking. We had arrived, park here said the man.

The drive way to our hotel.

I can't begin to articulate the stress I feel driving a car on the wrong side of the road, down streets too narrow for cars, with signage in a language I do not read, all the while having other road users behind me and pedestrians walking down the road centre. I was glad to be out of the car and for it to be valet parked. €32 a day parking is extortion but there was no way that car was coming out until it was time to leave Córdoba. All exploration would be done on foot.

Once divested of the car, we proceeded inside the hotel to check in whilst sipping a glass  of welcome cava. The hotel is boutique, formally a private palacio, with amenities and rooms going off in multiple directions. We were given a tour of the place which includes Roman ruins, visible underneath the floor of the breakfast restaurant. This was followed by the spa and sauna suite, after which we walked through the first building out through gardens, complete with a pool and outdoor bar area, into a separate 3 storey building and up to our room on the first floor. All very grand first impressions.

The lounge area.

After the ritual unpack, we headed off with map in hand to check out our rendezvous point for the next day's organised tour. The reconnoître took us through the main square and down a main street towards the river and the Alcazar that would be our first tour focus tomorrow. Once we knew where we were going, we headed back for a beer in the main square to relax, do some people watching and get the feel of our penultimate destination.

As we sat, taking in the sights, several Spanish matrons came through the establishment's tables and chairs and pushed past us, apparently not impressed that we were in their way. They settled at a table not far from us and continued to glare at us until we departed to return to the hotel. We have no idea what the problem was nor how we managed to cause offence when there were many other patrons sitting just like we were. 

The main plaza.

Anyway, back at the hotel it was time for dinner in the open air courtyard out the front of reception. The evening was very pleasant and we were one of the first groups to arrive. By the time we finished our meal, every table was occupied by guests. We were greeted by the Maître d' who showed us to our table and then sent one of the waiters to take our drinks order. This is where the 5 star rating of the hotel started to come unravelled slightly.

We ordered our food and a bottle of Verdejo, the Spanish really do rule supreme with that grape. The wine arrived in an ice bucket which I told him we did not require. He wanted to argue with me. I felt the bottle temperature, it was chill, unlike our wine waiter. "No ice bucket," said I. "The ice is not too cold," he said. No, I replied. He left with in a huff with the bucket. Our wine continued to open up as it warmed a little and allowed all those hidden honey notes to come to the fore. I watched with amusement as the wine waiter fawned over other more compliant guests. He didn't come near us again. Perhaps we should have summoned him to put an ice cube in each glass.

Which finally brings us to today's title. Who would have thought I'd be using white boy rapper Vanilla Ice as an theme? Not me. Anyway, in honour of our wine waiter who clearly doesn't understand wine, let's listen to Ice Ice Baby. I couldn't make it to the end of the song and all it proved was that John Deacon could write a ripping bass line. You can draw your own conclusions about the rapper.

I am uncertain as to whether there was discussion amongst the wait staff but the young woman who served our table, needed some serious lessons in how to wait and serve a table and how to place the dishes. It is not right to lean across the guests. Nor is it ok to slap the plates down on the table. If this was a café in the plaza, I would still make a comment about the poor etiquette, but this is a five star hotel and the food was coming from the Michelin kitchen. I guess it was easy to see why both of these servers had been relegated to the garden and were not allowed inside the restaurant.

We actually had dinner reservations for inside the hotel restaurant, Arbequina for Wednesday night, but cancelled on the back of tonight's performances. The food is the same in the restaurant or the garden, but I'd had enough of the service. The only other thing to note was the soundscape to dinner in the garden. It was just inside the walls of the palace so the screeching, squealing tyres of the taxis serenaded us throughout.

Another smooth transit day is over.

Until next time.