La Catedral

Tuesdays are half days with a field trip in the afternoon. My group went to the cathedral.

This courtyard is all that is left of the mosque that was here before the cathedral. The fountains were used for washing before entering the mosque, according to Muslim custom.

The cathdral is in the form of a Latin cross. 100% stone. It's amazing what they could do with it. Unfortunately, work was being done on the famous altarpiece so we couldn't see it. The organ (baroque style) is amazing! Maybe they hold organ concerts, that would be so cool! It covers both sides of two pilars.

There are a lot of statues and paintings of Santa Justa and Santa Rufina, that patronesses of Sevilla. Both were martyred in the first few centuries of Christianity.

The first image of the Virgin Mary in Sevilla is actually left over from the mosque. It is the only part of the mosque that survived to this day.

We saw the tomb of Columbus and his son. There are some disputes about whether or not those are actually the remains of Columbus but either way it was cool. The coffin (?) is held up by statues representing the kings of Leon, Castilla, Navarra, and Aragon.

There is a crucifix from the Baroque period. Very unique because it has the live Christ. His side has not yet been pierced.

In the museum part, one of the coolest things has got to be the keys to the city. They are the keys that literally opened the city gates.

Ooo and I ID'd a Murillo! Well, actually I guessed, but still. All thanks to that visit to the Prado Museum last year.

The Giralda tower has twenty-four bells with different rings for different occasions. At the top there is a two meter tall statue of a woman holding a palm and a flag, indicating the direction of the wind. At the end of our tour we walked up there. 34 flights of ramps, stairs would've been horrible. The view was really neat. You could see the whole city from there.