Hello everybody! A little over a week ago my brother, Matt, was able to visit Amanda and me in Spain and it turned out to be an awesome weekend. We already shared our visit to the Sevilla Cathedral but that was not the only place we adventured to. Another highlight of the weekend was our exploration of the Real Alcazar.
For those of you who are not familiar with the Real Alcazar, it is a royal palace located in the heart of Sevilla. The moors originally developed this incredible palace and the Alcazar continued to transform through the many changes Spain saw during its history. The Real Alcazar functions mainly as a museum to shed light on its historical functions, architecture and design. However, this fortress also boasts as the oldest royal palace still used as living quarters in Europe. The upper levels of the Alcazar are the official residence of the royal family when they are visiting Sevilla. If you are willing to pay a little extra you can even see this part of the Alcazar as well.
As you can imagine the Moorish architecture is beautiful and I can only hope that the pictures and videos do it justice. From the outside, the walls of the Alcazar give it the appearance of a castle. However, it is the inside of the Alcazar that is the most amazing part. Upon entering the Puerta del León, a small garden area funnels visitors in the Patio del León. The best part of this courtyard is the view of La Giralda just over the castle-like walls.
After some museum type exhibitions we stumbled upon the Patio de las Doncellas, which was my favorite courtyard in the Alcazar. The intricate Moorish arches that surround the courtyard are amazing.
Although I enjoyed the beautiful courtyards of the Alcazar, my favorite part of the royal palace was the vast gardens. My initial attraction to the gardens was not its picturesque nature or that they seemed to go on forever, which is incredible to experience. The main reason I was so intrigued by these royal gardens was the fact that part of HBO’s popular medieval fantasy drama series was filmed here. If you are familiar with the series you may start to realize that our pictures look very similar to the gardens of Dorne in season 5 of Game of Thrones. It was great to feel like a sand snake for the day even though I never crossed paths Jaime Lannister. By the end of our time in the Alcazar I could not help but think that winter was most definitely not coming to Dorne.
The only regret of mine was that we were not able to see the entire thing. We had made other plans for that day and did not give ourselves enough time to see the entire palace. However, I think that we saw enough to have made our visit to the Alcazar worthwhile. Especially considering that it was only 9.50 euros regular ticket and 2 euros for students between the ages of 17 and 25. I would absolutely put visiting the Real Alcazar atop your list of things to do while in Sevilla!
Thank you for reading and make sure to check out our video blog of an adventure in the Real Alcazar and the Gardens of Dorne! Stay tuned for more posts about Jerez, Spain and Paris, France!
-Mark
