Finally a new post!

Okay these first couple ones are not of the actually Cathedral in Granada (which at this point I have now visited with Scott and my friend Tyler while Scotty was here this past friday) but of a church connected to the cathedral where mass (misa) is held regularly as opposed to the cathedral which I believe might only be used on Easter and Christmas. But this was a couple weeks ago and a few friends of mine and I tried to see if the cathedral was open but stumbled upon this instead.  It was absolutely gorgeous.

Next came Sevilla and Ronda. We traveled here for the Friday and Saturday following orientation (the 4th and 5th of feb.) and got to see a pretty amazing amount in one day. the first one is of the cathedral of sevilla from the outside and the last three are in the inside of the cathedral.

pretty interesting stuff construction regarding the cathedral..was started in 1401 after/during the reconquista. very quick superficial history lesson for you all.  For more than 700 years large parts of spain were ruled by various muslim groups from northern africa.  At one point, the reyes catolicos (the catholic kings) only ruled a small portion of northern spain. the reconquista or re-conquest as the spanish call it technically was about a 700 year battle for control of regions of spain as they were essentially in a constant state of warfare around the center of the country pushing each other back and then losing ground etc etc. Anyway...in the 1400s the reyes catolicos finally made some real progress and eventually had their final victory in Granada in 1492.

anyway, in 1401 after they had taken over in Sevilla again, they constructed the cathedral of sevilla on the former site of the city's mosque (reusing pieces of the mosque in order to do so) the biggest thing they kept around was a tower (originally a minaret) which the catholics converted into a bell tower and remains mostly intact although it had to be renovated after an earthquake.  Its pretty cool though we got to walk all over the cathedral and up the tower as well which was built with ramps instead of stairs so that men could get to to the top more quickly on horseback.

this next one, if you want to see what islamic architecture looks like and get a feel for what the inside of the palaces of the Alhambra in Granada look like, is a good start.  Im bummed that it is a lengthy process to upload videos because I have a bunch more I need to get up and others some of you will definitely want to see.  But anyway, this particular video is el Alcázar...originally a moorish palace.

These last three are all of the inside of the Cathedral and are pretty self explanatory in my opinion. it was an incredible plac.