Travel Reports
Seville
“Now, does that look like linen or heavy denim weather to you?” Gazing out of the porthole window of my Ryanair flight to Jerez de la Frontera, deep in Spain’s sherry country, it was hard to give an answer to my fellow traveller. Sure, the sky was a milky blue, the kind you might see on a balmy July afternoon in England. But hadn’t the pilot warned of a chilly ground temperature of four degrees Celsius? That sounded more like heavy-denim-with-a-ruddy-great-overcoat weather.
By the time I’d reached my ultimate destination, the Hotel Occidental in Seville – via a cheapish (11 Euros) taxi ride from Jerez airport, past the Harvey’s Bristol Cream factory, to the railway station and an even cheaper (5,85 Euros) hour-long train ride through the dusty cereal fields of the Guadalquivir valley – I’d come across a man with an alternative solution to the clothing problem. Dressed in a tight red sweater stretched over a pair of grotesque false tits and bottomed off with a white pleated tennis skirt that barely covered his massive, hairy thighs, there was no apparent reason for his attire. Suggested marketing slogan to the tourist board here: “Welcome To Seville: Now Get Crazy”.
According to my guide for part of the weekend, the affable Javier, who runs Passion Tours, Seville reaches its apex of craziness during the annual fiestas of Semana Santa and Feria. The latter may have started as a livestock market, but it’s now a shameless excuse to eat, drink and be merry by dressing up in flamenco costumes and parading around on bedecked horses. Semana Santa, meanwhile, remains in essence a religious festival, but that doesn’t stop the local gay boys from taking to the celebrations with whole-hearted glee, building extravagant Madonnas to parade through the streets before partaking of the inevitable parties on the city’s small but lively scene. Javier implored me to come back for both (Semana Santa is in March, Feria in April) and I promised I would.
Seville is Spain’s fourth largest city after Madrid, Barcelona and Valencia, but in truth it’s a little further down the gaydar map. According to my trusty Shangay guide, Bilbao and Alicante have more gay venues, while popular resorts like Sitges and Torremolinos offer a more obvious lure to gay Bacchanalians. But what these destinations lack is Seville’s sense of the baroque.
I decided to start my two-day tour at the overwrought Plaza de España, a massive semi-circular building that’s a ceramicist’s dream – or nightmare, depending on their attitude to the job. Built for the 1929 Expo, what function it serves today remains a mystery, but it acts as a colourful backdrop for the legions of camera-wielding tourists, enamoured, no doubt, of the tiny crescent moon, Japanese-esque and intricately tiled bridges, and the small boats which ply the canal that arcs around the Plaza. It’s a Faberge egg of a building, if a Faberge egg was the size of the moon, and even appears to dwarf the nearby Cathedral.
A little wander through the Parque María Luisa, in which it lies, proved a joy, with its vast expanse of cypress trees and landscaped gardens. Then, a quick jog across the busy Avenida del Cid, through the gardens of the Alcazar (where local boys tumbled with their football) and the maze of alleys that make up the Barrio Santa Cruz, once home to Seville’s Jewish population. It’s now a tourist haunt, full of over-priced bars, extravagant floral displays, shady terraces and the odd orange tree, bloated with fruit even in January. My jog brought me to the Plaza del Triunfo, where the Alcázar and the Cathedral face each other off amongst the trinket shops.
In the smorgasbord of influences that make Seville such a fascinating mix of architecture and ideology, the Alcázar was here first. Despite being Moorish in design, it was built for the Christian kings Alfonso X and his son Pedro I, “The Cruel” (apparently, he had a thing for flashing his sword about). I entered the fortress through two blood-red doors and came to a courtyard overlooked by the royal palace (still occasionally used), which displayed an odd mix of Mudejar and Christian styles. Latin inscriptions to the glory of royalty compete with those extolling the virtues of Allah. Guided tours take place every half hour, but, not wanting to be persuaded by royals or religion, I chose to go it alone, and having feasted on the elaborate ornamentation of the various chambers, had a much-needed rest in the tranquil gardens, which combine Italian elegance with Moorish romance. Giant palm trees struggled to provide shade for a range of fishponds and water fountains and me. By now, the day was truly heating up, and I mused that my fellow traveller, wherever she was, was probably cursing her choice of heavy denim.
Across the square from the Alcázar lies the Cathedral, said to be the largest in the world. Of course, size isn’t everything, but the sight of this monster and its towering Giralda would have been enough to persuade even a spiritually bereft individual like me to kneel in awe – but for the unwanted attentions of a gypsy woman who kept trying to grab my palm as if it contained a stigmata. In terms of volume, Seville’s Cathedral leaves St Paul’s in the Vatican at the starting post – and that’s even before you take in the interior: soaring columns holding up a 140ft arch that sweeps across the nave; the huge dome of the Sacrista Mayor encompassing art by Murillo and Zurbarán; and the surrounding chapels containing more paintings by Murillo and Goya. Thankfully, the 300ft climb up the intricate minaret known as the Giralda required less effort than at first imagined. Designed to accommodate the horses of the muezzin during the Almohad rule, it’s a relatively gentle stroll, and the view from it rewarded my miniscule effort.
Next stop on the itinerary was the one I feared the most. La Maestranza is Seville’s bullring, another enormous construction, though the boast is volume, not length. Apparently, it can hold up to 13,500 spectators and the acoustics are designed so that you can almost hear what the bull’s thinking. But wild horses couldn’t drag me into this slaughterhouse, or its museum, so I contented myself with gazing at the shimmering whitewashed walls, interspersed with rather kitsch adverts for the art of the matador. If your conscience can take it, the museum contains the heads of slain bulls and plenty of those outrageous matador outfits. If it can’t, then cross the river to Triana, an attractive old gypsy district with lots of surprisingly ornate townhouses and cheap-as-chips cafes.
I’m told the best time to visit Triana is at dusk, when the two parallel, narrow streets, Calle Betis and Calle Pureza, are filled with hungry locals seeking out the scent of fried gambas. Betis is the better, as it faces onto the river and affords dreamy views back to Seville’s skyline. Although I got my timing wrong and missed out on the culinary treats promised by the various menus usefully posted outside each watering hole, it’s not hard to understand why this area is so popular. Be forewarned, though; many of the city’s gypsies have now been forced out to the suburbs by gradual gentrification, so if you’re expecting bars playing flamenco at every click of a heel, you’ll be disappointed. These days, you’re more likely to hear it booming from the stereo of a Seat Ibiza than in some backstreet bar.
Besides the gypsy tradition, Seville is the spiritual home of tapas, and here I had more luck. There is, however, an art to eating these dishes, according to my guidebook, that I never quite mastered. Rule number one is bad news for single travellers; get into a group of four or five people. Rule number two, order one tapa and one drink each and share the food. Rule number three, move on to the next bar and repeat until you can repeat no more. Perhaps this is why food in Seville seems to take forever. But if you’re determined to eat your way through the city, you should find some simple yet fine food and maybe come across the odd alarming-sounding combination like the Albondigas de Plátano (fried bananas in tomato sauce) I found at the Cuban bar La Habanita (3, Calle Golfo). Located among the crooked streets of the Centro district, just off Plaza Alfafa (nothing to send a postcard home about, but the centre of some attention for café-swilling Sevillianos), La Habanita is a (difficult) find among some fairly uninspiring shops. Wind your way through these streets, and you’ll eventually come to the Alameda de Hércules.
This long square – more of an oblong – is the centre of Seville’s gay nightlife. While many people appear to bring their own bottles and camp out in large, rowdy groups, there are a number of bars of note around the edges. El Bosque Animado and El Barón Rampante (“The Rampant Male”) lie next to each other on Calle Arias Montano and almost blend into one. Neither is large, which forces the crowds onto the street, even on chilly January evenings, but the atmosphere is good. Men To Men and El Hombre Y El Oso (“The Man and the Bear”) are somewhat euphemistically referred to in the gay guides as “men’s bars”, catering to an older crowd. Both can be found just off Alameda de Hércules at 38, Calle Trajano and 32, Calle Amor de Dios respectively. Ring the bell, and the rest is up to you.
Two venues which don’t seem to suffer from being out of the gay hub are the Isbiliyya bar opposite the Puente de Triana (2, Paseo de Colón) which attracts an energetic crowd, and the Hispalis Sauna close to Santa Justa Station (3, Calle Céfiro) which forms part of a chain of clean, friendly, well-equipped and decidedly hot saunas across Spain. Itaka (31, Calle Amor de Dios), meanwhile, is Seville’s long-standing nightclub, but doesn’t really get going until 3am. The night I went, it didn’t look like it would get going at all. Nevertheless, it’s a decent-sized space with a good chill-out bar and upstairs darkroom. In the summer months, it should really heat up.
But back in the Alameda de Hércules it was almost dawn and things were definitely cooling down. In the taxi back to my hotel – decent-sized rooms, excellent service and good food – I began to feel I’d found a city at rest. Judged on its architecture alone, Seville’s nothing less than extravagant, but those expected clichés of fiery flamenco bars and orange trees dripping with fruit hadn’t quiet materialised. It was, actually, a rather civilised city. I decided I’d come back for Semana Santa in March or Feria in April, if not this year then definitely next, to witness the city in full swing. By which time, I doubt I’ll have to worry about packing heavy denim.
British Airways flies direct to Seville from Gatwick Airport and Heathrow daily. 0870 850 9850. www.ba.com
Ryanair flies to Jerez from Stansted daily. www.ryanair.com
Gay-friendly hotels, transfers and excursions in Seville can be booked via www.octopustravel-gay.com
Gay tours of Seville can be arranged via Passion Tours. 0034 95 456 3245. E-mail: passiontours@teleline.es
Andrew Copestake
