October 27th Cadiz

Cadiz, October 27^th

The rain stopped, but the wind continued to bluster, whipping up the sea and making the palms dance. We decided to drive down to the old town and park at the railway station as there was a walking itinerary we were keen to follow which was written up in a little booklet we had picked up at the Toriva Tower yesterday. Cadiz was the place where the first ever Constitution was signed in 1812, and they make a lot of this event. The walk was based on this with buildings associated with the signing highlighted and a bit about them explained. There were also monuments and squares with write ups telling a bit of the history of the area and how people lived at the time.

A very cool tree

 The first major stop was at Constitution Square which was dominated by a massive statue with very detailed stonework/sculpturing which depicted various scenes from the signing.

The route next took us down to the sea walls, which were defensive walls and therefore had 90 cannon/gun turrets in them in their length. There were pretty gardens beside part of the walls, with bougainvillea on gazebos and fountains, tiles and large trees. Two trees in particular were noteworthy, and had been pointed out by our “guide” at the Toriva Tour yesterday, they were giant Ficus trees which had come from Chile. I can’t remember (or she didn’t tell us more), but there are two more in the south of the city, I think they are just showing the link with South America as that is very important to the people down here as Columbus lived here for a while.

Just across from the park was … a beautiful baroque style church which we entered to have a look around. It is pretty both from the outside and the inside. I used Jo’s Gorilla which she had kindly left for me to use, and which certainly helps with the camera shake and focus for these dull environments. (It is a tripod made up of a series of balls which allows for maximum flexibility and also it can grip onto things like poles as well as just standing on floors or other surfaces).  

Another cool tree

 From here we continued down a series of quite narrow streets, craning our necks to see interesting facades and wonderful iron-work balustrades and verandas, until we reached a large plaza which was surrounded by a number of buildings which both looked great but also were of historical significance. We entered one, the casino, it didn’t say it was open, but the door opened when we pushed on it firmly, and nobody stopped us wandering around and marvelling at the plasterwork. Again a truly incredible building with tiling, intricate lacy plasterwork of a Moorish nature, arches framing arches and a large open centre, but, saturation point made it slightly ho hum.

We took a break from our walk to have some lunch at a wee café, coffee and tostadas with olive oil and tomato for Di and me, and a plain hamburger and hot chocolate for Hilary (she doesn’t really eat badly… we do make sure she has plenty of fruit and vegetables too, and good growing food). It was quite chilly by now, so we headed to the museum of Cadiz. Lots of exhibits from Roman times, marble sculptures, sarcophagi, gorgeous clay pots, jewellery and some expensive children’s toys. We thought they were made from glass but we had the luck of standing close to an English speaking guide who was telling his group of two that they were in fact made from amber (some which looked like stone) and crystal. He said they were obviously from a wealthy family as the crystal was all hand made – little crickets and insects, and the amber figures were little animals hand carved.

The museum also housed an art gallery, many of the pieces were by famous Spanish artists I’m sure they were of great quality however many of them were religious pieces with Jesus with gaping wounds, and people having nasty things done to them.

The modern art was even worse, though not nauseating in the same sense. When Hilary asked me what they were like (she very sensibly sat on a comfortable chair and read the Kindle) and I replied that the one that I liked and understood the most was the fire hose in its glass case, she laughed with understanding.

A couple of handbags for sale in the shop windows of Cadiz

We decided we had really had our fill of Cadiz, not in a negative way at all, it really is a lovely little place, but it was time to move on, so we did.  We drove north to Seville about 110kms it was. Well to be correct we actually came to a little place 4kms out of Seville called Gelves (pronounced "Helv ess". The drive was taxing at times with horrendous cross winds and periodic downpours, but the scenery was pretty, reddish and golden rolling hills with freshly cut hay/seed crops and ploughed fields. 

Leaving Cadiz

Another solar farm

The Spanish bull

This place took some finding. Gelves itself was a bit of guesswork, but this camperstop at the marina (excuse me Marina!!! Seville is 100 plus kms from the coast) was really well hidden. We found it eventually after a few terse words shared amongst driver and navigator though. 

The reason that there is a marina here is that there is a large river. It is navigable all the way up to Seville which has a huge working port, and though we are a further 4-5kms up river there are plenty of large pleasure boats moored here too and a marina beside the river.  In fact, we are really amazed to watch the tides here. The river is really muddy, I'm not sure if it is worse because of the rain that we have had lately, though it hasn't rained in this vicinity for the last few days, or if it is always like this. However the tides are impressive. Looking out over the river on one side and the marina on the other, the water level changes by at least 2 metres (you can see the mark on the concrete lining of the marina) from low to high tide. (How can that happen I ask?) I worry about a tsumai of course, always looking for something to worry about and ruin my sleep, I've tried to calculate whether we would be safe or not here, but of course have no statistics or facts to help me with my reckoning biut to have us in strife the wave would need to be another 3 metres at least above high tide mark to have us getting our feet wet. What are the chances? Who knows, but what were the chances of being in Christchurch on that fateful day. See life will never truely be the same. We see earthquake problems everywhere we travel. The Spanish actually have quite a big history of catastrophic earthquakes, down here, mid 1700s was not a good time with Almeria devastated as well as Lisbon, and the Cathedral here in Seville also destroyed (along with much of the town). However people have that attitude that it wont happen again. Of course they are probably right, and many generations will get by without experiencing any problems, but let me tell you, when these places do shake, there will again be devastation, the buildings are beautiful but not sure about what building codes they meet.