Awakening and breakfasting surrounded by olive trees and their scent is a very peaceful start to the day, before driving to our next destination: Cordoba. As the hours and the miles go by, we are amazed to see field upon field and valley upon valley of olive groves, as far as the eye can see. This is after all Europe's main olive oil production area! That's a lot of olives! Danny, always the practical mind, can't help but wonder at the amount of human work required to pick them all...
Arriving in Cordoba, we find a great parking spot right on the other side of the Guadalquivir river from the famous Cordoba mezquita (mosque). Here's our view of it:
Cordoba in the 10th century, under the Moors, was the biggest city in Western Europe, with dazzling architecture, libraries, a university and highly skilled artisans of all types. This particular mezquita was one of the wonders of the world, unique in its kind even for the Moors, as it replicated a huge oasis of palm trees of 14.000 m2, with a total of 1293 columns and red-and-white arches disappearing into infinity. Here, thousands of worshippers would gather to pray to Alah. Imagine what that must have been like! Trust the Catholic Church to spoil things: when they conquered this city, they destroyed almost half of the columns to plonk a Cathedral in the middle of the mosque! Even king Carlos I, at the time, said to the Church authorities: "you have destroyed something that was unique to the world"... However, we find out that the sultan who had this mezquita built had himself destroyed the Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela and forced Christian slaves to carry its bells all the way to this mezquita to be used as oil lamps! It's really a question of successive faiths squashing one another instead of rejoicing in the greatness of each other and what they have in common...
Cordoba in the 10th century, under the Moors, was the biggest city in Western Europe, with dazzling architecture, libraries, a university and highly skilled artisans of all types. This particular mezquita was one of the wonders of the world, unique in its kind even for the Moors, as it replicated a huge oasis of palm trees of 14.000 m2, with a total of 1293 columns and red-and-white arches disappearing into infinity. Here, thousands of worshippers would gather to pray to Alah. Imagine what that must have been like! Trust the Catholic Church to spoil things: when they conquered this city, they destroyed almost half of the columns to plonk a Cathedral in the middle of the mosque! Even king Carlos I, at the time, said to the Church authorities: "you have destroyed something that was unique to the world"... However, we find out that the sultan who had this mezquita built had himself destroyed the Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela and forced Christian slaves to carry its bells all the way to this mezquita to be used as oil lamps! It's really a question of successive faiths squashing one another instead of rejoicing in the greatness of each other and what they have in common...
Little do we know, we have arrived just in time for an African heat wave. With temperatures at around 43º C, walking the streets of Cordoba makes us feel like pilgrims in the desert. Anita the dog is not allowed into air-conditioned bars, so when we find the famous Patio de los Naranjos, with its shady orange tree grove, and in the middle of it a large fountain, we agree to spend large parts of the afternoon, in between walks, sitting there with our legs in the cool water and Anita getting periodic showers.
After some more sight-seeing, we reward our heroic efforts with an ice-cold beer in a bar appropriately named "El Olivo", at the end of what we think is the prettiest street we have seen yet, with an ancient city wall and moat full of water and plants facing lovely little houses with hanging flowers, and a beautiful cascade of water at the other end. This photo really does not do it justice at all, but here it goes:
After being shafted at a tapas bar (nothing to do with Granada and its free delicious tapas!), and a good chat to the backdrop of Cordoba-by-night, we retire to our humble abode (thankfully shaded by big trees) for the night. 
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