2006 retirement tripSpain March 22 to April 7

Jerez de la Frontera

Tuesday 28 March, 2006  We left Sevilla this morning and caught the train back to Jerez de la Frontera. Our hotel is the bottom "H".  Jerez is a small, interesting very pleasant town.
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Tuesday 28 March, 2006  After checking in to our hotel, we had just enough time to see the Andalusian dancing horses. Jenni's buying our tickets.
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Tuesday 28 March, 2006  It was funny too. Jenni was struggling to buy the tickets speaking Spanish and the girl in the ticket booth asked her if she spoke English.
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Tuesday 28 March, 2006  The performances are held on Tuesdays and Thursdays only, at 12 noon. So we were lucky.
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Tuesday 28 March, 2006  The school itself. All of the riders in the display were trained at the school.
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Tuesday 28 March, 2006  The pavillion in which the horses perform.
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Tuesday 28 March, 2006  Translated: Royal Andalusian School of Equestrian Art. It is a 19th century baroque-style building designed by Charles Garnier (who also designed the Paris Opera.)
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Tuesday 28 March, 2006  The architecture of the school is very ornate and interesting.
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Tuesday 28 March, 2006  While we were waiting to enter the arena, a rider was putting a horse through its paces,
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Tuesday 28 March, 2006  Training 1
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Tuesday 28 March, 2006  Training 2
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Tuesday 28 March, 2006  Training 3
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Tuesday 28 March, 2006  Training 4
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Tuesday 28 March, 2006  Inside the arena. We were not allowed to photograph the horses as flash photography upsets them.
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Tuesday 28 March, 2006  The entrance from the stables.
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Tuesday 28 March, 2006  The Royal box. They still have royalty in Spain.
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Tuesday 28 March, 2006  After the show, we were able to see the horses from the show in the stable area.
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Tuesday 28 March, 2006  Quite fascinating were the nesting storks in the grounds. There are three nests in this picture.
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Tuesday 28 March, 2006  Jerez' Plaza de Toros. It was built in 1840 and rebuilt in 1872 and has a capacity of 9500.
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Tuesday 28 March, 2006  It was shut during our visit as it was seriously dilapidated.
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Tuesday 28 March, 2006  From what I could gather, it is no longer used for the sport of tormenting and killing animals.
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Tuesday 28 March, 2006  We wandered back to our hotel through the city centre. There's smoking everywhere in Spain, in restaurants especially.
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Tuesday 28 March, 2006  There were market stalls set up in the plazas.
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Tuesday 28 March, 2006  Live snails!  It's not just the French who eat garden pests.
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Tuesday 28 March, 2006  This stall was in a markets building.
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Tuesday 28 March, 2006  Locally grown flowers.
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Tuesday 28 March, 2006  After a nap we left the hotel at 7:30 PM. looking for somewhere to have dinner. Nothing open until 9:00 PM but we had a good meal for only €10 each including beer.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  Next morning, we head for Jerez'   Alcazar  .
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  The Alcázar was built in the 12th century.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  Some of the original Islamic Alcazar still exists, including the two gates, the mosque, the Arab baths and the octagonal tower
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  The Camera Obscura is situated in the tower at the top of the Palacio de Villavicencio
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  An Alcazar is a Spanish palace or fortress, originally one built by the Moors. This is the Puerta Alcazar (gate)
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  Parade ground and Villavicencio palace inside the Alcazar.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  Bortolome Fernandez de Villavicencio built the palace after he inherited the alcazar in 1664. The wall belongs to the Patio de Armas.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  The Antigua Mezquita or Mosque. Much of this remains from Moorish times.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  From the mezquita, across the Patio de Armas to the Villaviciencio Palace.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  Alfonso X  converted the Mezquita into a Christian chapel in 1264 - the year of the reconquest of Jerez.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  The Viilavicencio palace with the Octagonal tower in the background.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  Within the patio area, we see the first of many small water features.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  The  Patio de Armas (arms or weapons).
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  We are now in the main courtyard. The gardens are arranged in geometric shapes with a central water feature.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  A part of the wall attached to the mezquita. Behind the walls are empty areas not yet restored. The wall looks very ancient, probably 12th century.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  This is the side of the palace that faces the main courtyard. The palace was built over the top of the original Moorish palace.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  The effect of the water features is one of peacefulness . . .
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  . . . and tranquility.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  This is the roof of the mezquita, mosque now a chapel. The stone doorways lead to empty enclosures not yet rebuilt.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  The Octagonal tower was built in the 12th century by the Moors.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  The building on the left had some association with Ponce de Leon - the famed charlatan who claimed to have discovered the fountain of youth.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  Entrance to the Arab baths
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  These remain from Moorish times.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  Various rooms were heated to different temperatures.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  Natural lighting with symbols of Islam
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  Banos Arabes in Spanish
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  The gardens have been re-created in a Moorish geometric  style.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  The Alcazar under the Moors was part of a wall that surrounded the city. This relief map shows the Alcazar and the wall in the 12th century.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  Inside the palace. We were hoping to see the Camera Obscura but it was closed.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  This is the courtyard in front of the Alcazar, with the bodega (winery) just behind it and with the fertile wine growing hills in the distance.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  Gonzales Byass made sherry, a distortion of the word Jerez which itself is a distortion of the muslim word Scheras, their name for the town.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  We never got to see this part as it was closed for reconstruction.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  The octagonal tower was built by the Moors and is part of the original alcazar.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  The mezquita from the palace. Note the beautiful secluded garden behind the cypress trees.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  The cathedral is visible from the Palace.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  The octagonal tower of the mezquita. This was also the most magnificent weather we had in the whole time we were away. 24° and brilliant blue skies.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  The octagonal tower and part of the old wall frame the moorish-inspired gardens below.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  Two cranes fly over the Alcazar.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  Parts of the old wall and embattlements. In dire need of restoration.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  It was beautiful and quiet inside the gardens of the Alcazar. This was a welcome relief after the noise and bustle of Sevilla.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  We're now back outside the Alcazar looking at the Camera Obscura and  the Palacio de Villavicencio
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  This part of the Alcazar formed part of the city walls at one time but is not original Moorish.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  The octagonal tower can be seen in the distant centre of the picture and this is original Moorish.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  The Gonzales Byas Bodega is literally next door to the cathedral
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  The Gonzales Byass company is the city's biggest sherry producer and its most famous sherry is Tio Pepe - Tio meaning Uncle and Pepe for Jose.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  From the winery entrance, looking up to the plaza is filled with flowering ground cover.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  Manuel Maria Gonzales Angel 1812-1887 the founder of the Bodega. It was this man's uncle who gave his name to the Tio Pepe sherry.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  The cathedral's dome and belfry.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  The cathedral was built between 1695 and 1778 (when the first fleet arrived in Botany Bay) on the site that was the town's main mosque.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  To quote: "Jerez' cathedral boasts a rich variety of baroque, gothic and neoclassical styles."
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  The Mudejar-gothic belfry was built in the 15th century. As mentioned several times before, the Mudejars were the muslims who remained in Spain after the reconquest but did not convert to Christianity.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  The grotesque front entry of the cathedral.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  Near to the Alcazabar is the old quarter so we head into it to see what we can find. Flamenco tonight?
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  We find ourselves in an absolutely fascinating part of town - apparently abandoned in the 19th century.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  We're looking for Ponce de Leon's monument but tourist maps provide clear directions to MacDonald's but not too much else. We never find it.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  This was eight  years before the European discovery of Australia's east coast . . .
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  . . . but almost exactly 500 years since the reconquest of Jerez.  Amazing!
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  This was obviously a very important building in its day, but now it's in complete ruin.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  Fabulous. The Spain of the travel brochures.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  Hopefully not too late, the area is being restored - into apartments mainly to feed Spain's housing boom. Boom's are good for something but they always bust.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  It's now after 2:00 PM. You know what that means don't  you?
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  Everything is shut for siesta.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  We find a nice little plaza and decide to have some lunch . . .
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  . . . at a very ordinary cafe - except that they charged us €15.50 for a €7 meal. Without the language, there's nothing you can do. Mostly the people here in Jerez  were helpful and friendly but this sort of thing happened too often in Spain.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  This is just after 2:00PM and there's not a soul around. Very curious indeed. But, really, it was just robbery of unempowered tourists.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  During siesta is the time when the maintenance crews clean up . . .
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  Siesta.  It's hard to comprehend everything being closed at would otherwise be the busiest time of the day.  It must drive normal European countries nuts.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  That night we went to see genuine Flamenco - excellent. Not unexpectedly, the kitchen didn't open until 9:30 and the show didn't start until 10:30.
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Wednesday 29 March, 2006  The show finished at midnight so we caught a cab back and slept well. Tomorrow we catch a train to Granada.   END OF OUR VISIT TO JEREZ     Next we go to Granada.
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GranadaNext: Granada Circuito de JerezPrevious: Circuito de Jerez
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