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Published: February 28th 2010
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On day four of our roadtrip Derek and I had a lot planned before making the five hour drive to Cádiz, which is on the southern coast of Spain. We woke up early in the morning and drove to Belém Tower on the west side of Lisbon to take a few pictures. Belém Tower is a fortified tower and an UNESCO World Heritage Site due to the significant role it played in the Portuguese maritime discoveries.
After the tower we decided to take a short detour and go to Sintra - a town just north of Lisbon. While looking around Lisbon we saw so many postcards showing the beautiful city of Sintra and it caught our interest so we knew we had to see it before leaving Portugal. The town of Sintra is also an UNESCO World Heritage Site because of its 19th century Romantic architecture and it was a beautiful city located on the top of a small mountain. Luckily for Derek and I, we had some sun come out during our visit to Sintra and that made the detour even more enjoyable!
The one thing that Derek really wanted to do on this trip was visit Évora, Portugal and
see the Capela dos Ossos or The Chapel of Bones. So, after a quick visit to Sintra, we drove to Évora and spent a few hours walking around the city. We walked around the Praca de Giraldo and began searching the city for the Bone Chapel. It was actually quite hard to find the Bone Chapel as it was not on any map that we had of Evora. When we finally found it, it had just closed for lunch (for 2 hours!) so we went to a nearby restaurant, had some lunch, and waited for the chapel to open.
The Capela dos Ossos is a chapel attached to the Royal Church of St. Francis and its walls and central pillars are covered with human skulls and other parts of skeletons, held together by cement. It was created by a few Franciscan monks in the 16th century as a practical solution to a problem - as many as 42 monastic cemeteries were taking up valuable space in Évora, so they moved all the bones to a single consecrated chapel. Seeing an opportunity to contemplate and communicate the inevitability of death, the monks chose to display the bones prominently rather than storing
them away. The entrance of the chapel is a large arch bearing a painted rhyme reminding visitors of their own mortality: Nós ossos que aqui estamos, pelos vossos esperamos: "Our bones that are here wait for yours!"
We arrived in Cádiz, Spain around 9:00pm and we were ready to go out and celebrate carnival! It was a really warm evening - about 15 degrees - so it made it nice to go out in...I think we even wore our sandals! Cádiz copied the carnival of Venice and it has become the liveliest and most dazzling carnival town in mainland Spain, famous for its amusing and creative characters and satirical song groups. The concierge at our hotel gave us details about where the main parties in the city would be and Derek and I found all of them. The narrow streets were packed with people and in a cross-section of the main street there were bands performing. Tons of people were dressed up and they were selling food an wine on the side of the street. It was quite something to see. It was hard for us to join in the fun since we didn't speak the language, but we still
had fun and were right there in the crazy carnival party!
Even though it was raining the next morning, we spent some time on the Playa de la Victoria beach, which was where our hotel was located. I had a little too much fun taking pictures there and while setting my camera up on a rock to take a timed picture of Derek and I jumping on the beach, the wind blew my camera down and it did a face plant on the sand. It survived the fall, but unfortunately the shutter doesn't close over the lens and you can't really use the zoom function :S.
Since we arrived in Cádiz at night, we wanted to see some of the city during the day, so we walked along the coast of Cadiz and saw the most popular beach, the Playa de la Caleta, and went to the Castillo de Santa Catalina, which is of Christian origin built in the 13th century. The architecture and scenery in Cadiz is really interesting because it's a coastal city, so it has lots of palm trees and beaches, but it also has old cathedrals and buildings from the 16th and 17th centuries and
has many influences from Arabic culture.
The last stop before our long drive back to Madrid was to Seville. Seville is the fourth largest city in Spain and is over 2,000 years old. Although it has a strong medieval, renaissance and baroque heritage, like Cádiz, Seville received heavy influences from Arabic culture. We explored the old Jewish Quarter of Seville, Santa Cruz, and saw the Plaza Virgen de los Reyes, the Palacio Arzobispal, and the famous Seville Cathedral and La Giralda. The cathedral was built from 1401-1519 on the former site of the city's mosque. It is amongst the largest of all medieval and Gothic cathedrals, in terms of both area and volume. The interior is the longest nave in Spain, and is lavishly decorated, with a large quantity of gold evident. The Cathedral reused some columns and elements from the mosque, and, most famously, the Giralda, originally a minaret, was converted into a bell tower. It is topped with a statue, known locally as El Giraldillo, representing Faith.
The last day of our roadtrip was spent in Madrid. Derek and I began our day by walking over to Plaza Mayor and seeing the statue of Filipe III on
a horse. We went to the famous Plaza de Cibeles, which is a square with a neo-classical complex of marble sculptures with fountains that has become an iconic symbol for the city of Madrid. The fountain depicts the goddess Cibeles, the Phrygian goddess of fertility, sitting on a chariot pulled by two lions. From there we went to a bunch of the city's major monuments including the Parque del Retiro, the National Library, and "El Oso y El Madrono" (the bear and the strawberry tree), which is known as the symbol of Madrid.
After a quick lunch of paella, red wine, and sangria, it was time to drive back to the Madrid Airport and head back to Brussels.
It was an amazing roadtrip and we certainly covered a lot of ground and saw some really cool things. Best part of the trip for me? Spending the week with my big brother, of course! Oh, and Spanish radio!!!!! There's nothing like hearing the Spanish version of 'Hey Jude' and instead of the "na na na na" part, they sing "olé olé"!
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