First city: Cordoba, home of La Mezquita. We only spent a few hours in this very, very hot city but it was well worth the stop. La Mezquita is a hybrid of two architectural styles and religions. This mosque, built in the Mudejar style after the original Christian Visigoth church was destroyed, now has a sixteenth-century cathedral plonked right in the middle of it. This is because Cordoba and the surrounding region changed hands between Muslim and Christian monarchs over the course of several centuries. As with all of the monuments and cities that I will describe in these next few blog posts, it is hard to capture the beauty of La Mezquita in words or photos. It was amazing to see the combination of seemingly opposing architectural styles in one outstanding building.
A professional guide gave us a tour of this incredible building and afterwards we visited the Juderia neighborhood, the Jewish quarter. While there is no longer a prominent Jewish population in Cordoba, this neighborhood is known for its whitewashed buildings and window boxes full of flowers. After our tour, several of us students took a break from the heat in a local tapas restaurant and sipped tinto de verano, a popular drink that is similar to sangria and is very refreshing. I would have loved to spend more time in this quaint city, meandering through its narrow streets. On to Seville!
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