Cordoba

Cordoba was our next stop. A long train ride took us down to Andalucia, where i expected it to be warm...but it was pretty cold. Cordoba had an ugly modern outer ring, a decent turn of the century area, and a really charming old town. The most distinctive thing i remember from the old town was that all the buildings were white stucco with yellow trim. Few buildings were taller than 2 or 3 stories It seemed that everything was freshly painted, a nice change from Barcelona´s graffiti scarred old town. The main architectural focus in Cordoba is the ¨Great Mosque¨ (as we learned it in history class...although they call it the "Great Cathedral" today). We were lucky enough to stay in a nice hotel that was right next to the structure. In terms of architecture, it was kind of a shame that the Christians took over the mosque. The Christian architecture was Gothic, and didn't match the old mosque's architectural aesthetic at all. This makes for a weird mix of Islamic and Christian architecture. As I observed, the building is pretty much a huge empty mosque with a cathedral just plopped into the middle. The great arched hallways are well fitted for Muslim worship, not Christian. This is obvious because the great halls around the cathedral are just dead space.

The great mosque from the outside...the towers are Christian additions.
The clashing of cultures: the mosque´s double arches painted white and red, along with the cathedral´s Gothic stone arches.

The mosque´s famous double arched halls that seem to stretch forever, empty
Entry into the Mosque´s orange tree courtyard from the street

Elaborate tile work on the Mosque´s facade The beautiful window of a common apartment in the old town. I saw many windows in this style all over Andalucia...the stained glass was an added touch i had not seen in many places.
The mosque´s minaret is visible from the ¨alley of the flowers¨

This ancient Roman bridge is under a total restoration. It is one of the most exciting restoration projects I have ever seen or even heard of. They are painstakingly taking each stone off, cleaning them, then putting them back in the exact same place. The white part in the front has already been restored. It is expected to open to pedestrians in 2016.
One of the last things we did was take a tour of a historic house. It was home to one of the first paper mills in the western world. The courtyard contained an awesome tub filled with flowers