Spain: Cordoba and the Mezquita

The famous arches of the Mezquita soar above visitors to Cordoba's
unique Mosque-Cathedral. Some of the cathedral elements can be seen here.  

Cordoba has the largest old quarter of all the cities in Spain, but it's also one of the easiest to navigate, using the Guadalquivir River, its bridges, and the gigantic Mezquita as reference points. You're always going to be within a few blocks of one of these.

We arrived by train from Seville on Saturday, May 11, and took a taxi to the tiny Hotel Madinat, which offers a handful of well-appointed rooms in an old manor house. Between the train station and our hotel we saw attractive tree-line boulevards in the modern part town, along with inviting stores and restaurants. But we were headed to the old quarter. It's quite amazing how people flatten themselves against buildings or find safety in a recessed doorway when a car comes down the old quarter's impossibly narrow streets. Once at the hotel, we were happy to find that the Mezquita is only 350 meters away, and the river and a riverfront restaurant row are even closer.  Everything we'd need during our three-night stay here. Without a car, we didn't venture out of the old quarter to explore this city of 325,000 people.  

Nor did we see everything there is to see, most notably we skipped the Medina Azahara ruins a few miles outside town. The fortified palace-city was built in the 10th century and abandoned in the 11th century after being sacked in a civil war. Its substantial ruins, now about 10 percent excavated, show that it had aqueducts, reception halls, baths, a mint, barracks and aristocratic residences.  But there's a lot to see in Cordoba without leaving the old quarter.

We visited what's left of Cordoba's small synagogue, dating from 1315 and converted to a hospital in 1492 when the Catholics Monarchs sent Jews and Muslims into exile. It's on Plaza Maimonides. There are only two other surviving synagogue buildings in Spain, both in Toledo, and we visited one of them, too. 

We happened to be in town on the last day of Cordoba's annual 10-day Festival of Flowers, also called the Patio Festival, in which many private gardens are open to the public.  From what we could see, many of the potted flowers hung on patio walls were past their prime, but it was long lines that kept us out.  Much of the old quarter is adorned with hanging plants anyway. 

The city's star attraction is the Mezquita, also known as the Mosque-Cathedral, a huge mosque dating to 785 and expanded through the centuries.  The mosque's most famous feature is the two-tiered arch, highlighted with orange stripes at the top, that is repeated in seemingly endless rows. The building was converted into a cathedral in 1236 when Cordoba was captured by the Catholic forces of the kingdom of Castille. In the 1500s, the former minaret was remodeled to become a belltower, and a Catholic nave was inserted into the center of the very Islamic building.  To today's visitor, it seems that a Renaissance cathedral fell from the sky into the middle of the building. There was no attempt to meld the sharply different architectural styles. There are also Catholic shrines or chapels sprinkled around the walls. 

Souvenir shops surround the Mezquita, but other than a few Cordoba-specific items, there's little that couldn't be bought in any other Spanish city. Heading to the hotel after coming up empty-handed at the shops, we came across the town's Arab baths, the Hammam Al Andalus, which is on the route between the hotel and the Mezquita. We made appointments for the next day. You wear swimsuits to soak first in a warm pool, and then you keep the swimsuit on for your body scrub or massage. We visited three such spas on this trip, and all had warm soaking pools in candle-lit basements beneath old brick-vaulted ceilings. 

 We had dinner twice here at Regadera, across the street from the Guadalquivir River and close to both our hotel and the Mezquita.  What we liked, besides the food, was that we could eat indoors in relative quiet and with plenty of space between tables. Other meals in Cordoba were at tables on busy sidewalks.

Here are some photos:

The Torre de la Calahorra sits at the end of the Puente Romana (Roman Bridge)
 across the Guadalquivir River from Cordoba's medieval gate. The Mezquita is
 just a few steps beyond the gate. The river was navigable to the Atlantic 
Ocean at Cadiz in Roman times, but now navigation is possible only 
  between Cadiz and Seville, downstream from Cordoba. The
 Guadalquivir is the only navigable river in Spain.

An entrance to the Mezquita leads into
a courtyard with orange trees. This is the 
Puerta de Santa Catalina, which was
added in the 16th century.

Another view of the courtyard, the Patio de los Naranjos. The high roof
is above the cathedral nave and the dome is above the altar. 

The Torre del Alminar was built in 957 as a 
minaret. It was later modified to become
the cathedral's belltower.

The belltower is open to Mezquita visitors.
It is adjacent to the Mezquita's original
entrance, now known as Puerta del 
Perdon, or Door of Forgiveness.

The double-tiered arches with their orange stripes make for a magical interior,
though visitors will find it much darker than this. I brightened all my 
photos taken inside the Mezquita.

The main altar of the Mezquita's cathedral. The Renaissance-style
arches seen at right support the nave's roof and depart sharply
from the Islamic arches that support the rest of the building.

Visitors can sit down in the cathedral.

The ceiling above the nave shows how Renaissance design
was imposed in the Mezquita.

Streets in Cordoba's old quarter are narrow
and crowded.

Potted plants hang on walls throughout 
the old quarter.

Bougainvillea spills down a wall in the old quarter.

One of the old quarter's wider streets.

A carriage driver looks for passengers between the Mezquita and the city gate.

Souvenirs mimic the architecture
of the Mezquita.

Hanging flower pots seem to be a thing in Cordoba.
Here they're for sale at a tourist shop.

Women once sat in the balcony of the Cordoba synagogue while men worshipped 
on the main level. The synagogue was built in 1315 and was used until 1492 when
Jews were expelled from Spain or forced to convert to Catholicism. The building
had several secular uses over the centuries. In 1884 its original use was accidently
 rediscovered, it was declared a national monument and its restoration was begun. 

The reception area at the Hotel Madinat. The tile floor
is original to the building, a former manor house.