Day 19 The Alhambra

What a day! Perfect weather again - I have rarely experienced such clear conditions. The light is different here. After another lazy start (11am), this was to be our big day - the Alhambra. Because of the compact nature of the city we were comfortable with walking there. By now we were also comfortable about finding our way. After the Plaza Nueve it was a steady climb up to the fortress precinct. The crisp morning air and the tree-shaded avenue counteracted the steam generated by our ascent. Along the path was a statue of Washington Irving, the author of Tales of the Alhambra.
 
A word about time. The Spanish have the clock set quite differently to Australians, relative to the opposition of the sun. In my view, the clock here is advanced by about two hours, so 11am actually feels much earlier.

We had to ascend to the far end of the Alhambra - a medieval town, fortress and palaces set on a small plateau overlooking the modern city - to collect our prepaid tickets booked over the Internet. Parts of the Alhambra are open to the public for free, but the most sought after areas are rationed to 6,000 visitors a day. As we collected our tickets we saw that they were already sold out for the day. Not only does one need to book ahead, one must also nominate a time to enter the Palacios Nazaries, the best of the Moorish architecture. We had opted for 4pm, so spent the intervening time looking at Palacio Carlos V, a huge square stone pile with a circular open courtyard (you can see it from Google Earth). There were two excellent free exhibitions in its perimeter, one about Moorish archeological finds, the other about Christian medieval art, mainly paintings. 

The grounds are also very attractive with a huge amount of topiary. Here as elsewhere in the city, most paths are paved in fieldstones, often with playful patterns set in them. In the palaces, the floors were mostly marble, and it an exquisite pleasure to shuffle along over this silky smooth surface; beats concrete pavement any day.

The views from the perimeter of the Alhambra are simply stunning - to the adjacent hills from which we looked yesterday, over the city, and of course up to the Sierra Nevada range. We also did a quick recce of the Generalife area before returning to the main part to queue for our 4pm entrance. They let in 300 people an hour but you can stay as long as you like.

Palacios Nazaries is a series of rooms or palaces, with open courtyards. The main element in all of them is the fantastic level of detail in the interior decoration - colourful tiled walls, ornately sculpted cornices and ceilings. The extent of this is almost unbelievable - it is truly overewhelming. The main central courtyard, the one we have all seen pictures of, was unfortunately undergoing restorations, so there was ugly scaffolding spoiling the experience a little. We stayed for over an hour. To finish off, we toured the medieval fortress with its superb views of the city. Between us we took 943 photos, a new record.

We had dinner at Plaza Nueve, in a Turkish Doner Kebap restaurant. Very good it was, too.