Our visit to the Alhambra finally took place Friday afternoon. We have spent this week in Granada seeing the Alhambra from below and across the valley...
...in the fading daylight...
...and at night when it's all lit up...
I was a little concerned that we might find it an anticlimax. There is so much hype...images of the Alhambra are in every tourist publication. We met other tourists for whom this was the only reason to visit the city (e.g. "this has been on my bucket list forever!") I have been fortunate to visit other famous Islamic sites such as the Taj Mahal, Fatehpur Sikri and others in India, and wondered if this would be as good. Well, it is! Herewith a selection of fabulous images of Generalife, built as the emir's summer palace at the end of the 13th C:
And from the Nasrid Palace. This place is actually a collection of palaces, or rooms, built over many centuries, used by Isabel and Ferdinand as their palace for several years, and has been lovingly restored, first beginning in the mid-1800s, and is ongoing.
Elaborately carved plaster is everywhere...
...as are elaborate ceramic tile work--but we found this tile work less intricate than in Morocco. I wonder if the Moors continued to develop their ceramic inlay skills after expulsion from Spain to Morocco but the craft remained static here?
A fabulous ceiling...
And what it looks like from the outside...
Photo credits mainly to Lloyd! I was content to wander and admire. I loved the water flowing everywhere...through channels, into and out of pools, fountains, reflecting pools...
Granada is blessed with a good water supply which is what attracted the Moors (and others before and since) in the first place. A lack of water was the undoing of the Islamic rulers in Fatehpur Sikri in India, where all the elaborate fountains are dry, so it was a pleasure to see these water gardens in action.
A welcome chair! (I need a haircut!!)
We're now in Córdoba, having taking the train here this morning (Saturday). We have a small apartment (Casa Pepa) for 4 nights in the old part of the city and have just shopped for enough groceries for the next couple of days. The market (fresh fruit, veg, bread, meat, fish, cheese, eggs) is nearby as well as a supermarket for everything else (wine and milk!)
When we visited the Alhambra we were told that the plaster used for the carving was a mix of alabaster, egg whites, and something else that I can't recall. No info was provided regarding how the billions of egg yolks were used.
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