It was a short drive from Cadiz to Sevilla, about an hour and a half. Compared to Cadiz, Sevilla is a big city. It is one of Spain's most historic cities and so it combines the new with the old. In the central historic zone they have regulations preventing the new from creeping in too much, but even in the older parts if Sevilla, you definitely feel as if you are in a larger, more dynamic city. It has a bit of a buzz about it.

Due to our early arrival at our hotel (the H10 Casa de la Plata), our room wasn't ready yet, so they stowed our bags for us and we went out to explore a bit. Our hotel is located deep in the old part of the city, so much so that our driver had to carry our bags (not light) over cobblestones for a quarter mile or so. Good thing he was big and strong! The concierge had given us a map with a few notable places marked on it and we saw "El Rinconcillo, the oldest restaurant in Sevilla" noted on one that was just a short walk from our hotel so we went over to have a look. We arrived at about 12:45 pm and there was a line of about 30 people waiting to get in when the restaurant would open at 1:00 pm. So we hopped into the line and waited. While we waited I read that "El Rinconcillo is the oldest tapas bar in Seville, the city where tapas originated, and given its age, dating back to 1670, it is possible that the tradition began here. " No wonder people were lining up to get in the place!
At just about 1:00 pm on the dot the doors opened and we all flooded in. It was like playing musical chairs. By the time we got through the door the main salon was jammed so we made a left and occupied a couple of spots at the bar.

Some older bottles lining the walls at El Rinconcillo

In Spain it is very traditional to stand at the bar while you eat and drink, so we threw ourselves right into it. Pretty soon the whole room was full of people. There was a baby stroller right behind me complete with baby. We had a couple of tapas: champiñones al ajillo (mushrooms with garlic) and anchovies on toast, and some non-alcoholic beer, which is very popular now in Spain and very tasty. We ate our tapas and drank in the atmosphere. A great introduction to Sevilla.

After our experience in El Rinconcillo, it was still a while before our room would be ready so we decided to take a walk to the Plaza de España, a huge open plaza that was built for an international exposition that took place in the 1920s. It is really an impressive sight. There is a sort of moat that runs through part of it (complete with bridges over the moat) where they rent boats for people to row around. Each region of Spain has a dedicated portion of the plaza.
Plaza de España, Sevilla

A horse carriage at the Plaza de España.

After viewing the Plaza de España we grabbed a cab back to our hotel (it was a long walk there and our feet were a bit tired). Our hotel room had a nice view of a small walking street below:

We had a bit of time for relaxing and writing witty blog posts before it was time to attend our second flamenco performance (faithful readers may recall that we saw a flamenco performance in Granada which completely floored us). Tonight we were scheduled to attend a show at Teatro Flamenco Sevilla which is in the area called Triana on the other side of the Guadalquivir River from the central part of Sevilla. We were met by our guide, Sophie, who is a flamenco aficionado (she thought she might have seen several hundred shows) who showed us the way to the theater and then took us to a couple of her favorite tapas bars after the performance. The show was very good and we did enjoy it a lot, but when we inevitably compared it to the show we saw in Granada, it just didn't have the duende that the Granada show had. The performers in Sevilla were professionals and very skilled. We talked about the differences between the two shows quite a bit but it was nearly impossible for us to pinpoint why the show in Granada was so great while the show in Sevilla was good but didn't move us the way we had been moved in Granada. I'm glad that Jane and Alex got to see the show in Granada so they could understand how exciting flamenco can be.

Our post-flamenco tapas tour was very enjoyable. We first went to a tiny little bar that was pretty full when we got there and was even more full when we left. We had a selection of cheeses, some great olives, gildas (skewers of peppers, cheese and anchovies), marinated carrots, toast with anchovies, tortilla española, and probably a few other items that I forget now. But it was really fun to be there with so many people all having a great time eating delicious tapas.

As we were walking back to our hotel we ran across another group of "penitents" practicing for carrying the heavy statues of Jesus and Mary during Holy Week. There were about 30 or 40 of them carrying a wooden platform that was stacked with about ten bars of concrete about as big around as a parking lot barrier. Heavy!

Tomorrow we get to tour the royal palace and gardens of Sevilla and visit a few more tapas places.