Wellness Retreat in Seville

Seville's airport (SVQ) is just 10km from the city center — a 15-minute taxi ride. Check into your hotel and walk immediately to the Barrio Santa Cruz — the old Jewish quarter that adjoins the cathedral and Alcázar, a maze of whitewashed lanes, flower-decked balconies, and hidden plazas connected by passages barely wide enough for two people to pass. The neighborhood is entirely closed to cars and feels suspended in another century. The Plaza de Santa Cruz, with its central iron cross, and the Plaza de Doña Elvira are the most beautiful squares in the neighborhood. Your first tapas evening begins at the Bar El Rinconcillo (open since 1670, the oldest bar in Seville) for a fino sherry and a plate of spinning jamón and cheese, then continue to one of the bars on Calle Mateos Gago, the most concentrated tapas street in the city, for montaditos, croquetas, and espinacas con garbanzos (spinach with chickpeas, the Seville signature dish).

• ✦ Barrio Santa Cruz — the labyrinthine old Jewish quarter
• ✦ Bar El Rinconcillo — the oldest bar in Seville, open since 1670
• ✦ Fino sherry and tapas — the correct Seville introduction
• ✦ Plaza de Doña Elvira at dusk

The Real Alcázar (Royal Palace) of Seville is one of the most beautiful buildings in the world — a Moorish palace complex begun by Moorish kings in the 10th century and continuously expanded by Christian monarchs, most magnificently by Pedro I of Castile in the 14th century, whose Mudéjar palace combines Islamic art and architecture with Christian symbolism in a fusion that is one of the great artistic achievements of medieval Europe. The Salon de los Embajadores (Hall of Ambassadors), with its coffered cedar ceiling, and the tiled courtyards of the Patio de las Doncellas are extraordinary. Book the first entry slot (9:30am) and take your time. The Seville Cathedral, directly adjacent, is the world's largest Gothic cathedral and the third-largest church building on earth — built on the site of the Great Mosque as a deliberate statement of Christian triumph. The Giralda tower (the original minaret, climbed by a ramp rather than stairs) offers the finest views in the city. Christopher Columbus is buried here.

• ✦ Real Alcázar — Mudéjar palace of extraordinary tiled beauty
• ✦ Patio de las Doncellas — courtyard in reflecting pool perfection
• ✦ Seville Cathedral — the world's largest Gothic cathedral
• ✦ Giralda tower climb for panoramic city views

Triana, across the Guadalquivir River from the old city, is the birthplace of flamenco and remains the most genuinely Sevillano neighborhood — working-class, proud, and intensely local. The Ceramics Museum of Triana tells the story of the neighborhood's famous ceramic tile tradition (the azulejos that decorate the Alcázar come from here). The Mercado de Triana is an excellent covered market for Sevillano produce. Cross back over the Puente de Isabel II for afternoon exploration of the Arenal neighborhood (where the bullring and the old trading houses stood) and the riverfront. In the evening, book a flamenco performance at Casa de la Memoria or La Carbonería — both intimate, authentic venues where the focus is on the art rather than the tourist show. True flamenco — jondo, deep, emotional — is one of the most moving performance traditions in Europe, and Seville is its natural home.

• ✦ Triana neighborhood — the birthplace of flamenco
• ✦ Mercado de Triana for Sevillano ceramics and produce
• ✦ Guadalquivir riverfront promenade
• ✦ Authentic flamenco tablao — Casa de la Memoria or La Carbonería

Córdoba is just 45 minutes from Seville by AVE high-speed train — one of the easiest and most rewarding day trips in Spain. The Mezquita-Catedral of Córdoba is one of the world's great buildings: a vast Moorish mosque built between the 8th and 10th centuries by the caliphs of Córdoba, who ruled the most sophisticated city in medieval Europe, and then grotesquely (but fascinatingly) invaded in the 16th century by a Gothic cathedral inserted directly into the middle of the hypostyle prayer hall. The result is one of the most extraordinary architectural collisions in the world — 858 columns of jasper, marble, and granite supporting double arches of alternating red brick and white stone, with an entire Renaissance cathedral growing from its heart. The old Jewish Quarter of Córdoba — the Judería — surrounds the Mezquita with narrow whitewashed lanes and the famous Flower Alley (Calleja de las Flores). Return to Seville by early evening.

• ✦ AVE high-speed train Seville to Córdoba — 45 minutes
• ✦ Mezquita-Catedral — the great hypostyle mosque with a cathedral inside
• ✦ Judería and Calleja de las Flores — the Flower Alley
• ✦ Córdoba's old bridge and Roman temple

The Plaza de España, built for the 1929 Ibero-American Exposition, is one of the most spectacular public spaces in Spain — a semicircular colonnaded palace in Spanish Renaissance Revival style, with a canal running along its curved facade, ceramic tile alcoves representing every province of Spain, and bridges over the canal that give it a Venetian quality. The adjoining María Luisa Park, Seville's great urban park, is beautiful in any season but extraordinary in spring when the jacaranda trees bloom purple. Afternoon: drive or take a bus to Jerez de la Frontera (1.5 hours south) for a tour and tasting at the González Byass bodega — home of Tío Pepe fino sherry, one of the world's great drinks, made from Palomino grapes grown in the chalky albariza soil of the Jerez wine country. The sherry caves (cathedral-like vaulted stone cellars holding thousands of butts aging under the flor yeast culture) are extraordinary.

• ✦ Plaza de España — 1929 exposition colonnaded masterpiece with ceramic tiles
• ✦ María Luisa Park — Seville's great romantic public garden
• ✦ González Byass bodega — home of Tío Pepe fino sherry
• ✦ Jerez sherry caves and solera aging system

Seville's Museum of Fine Arts in the Convento de la Merced is the second most important art museum in Spain after the Prado — and one of the least visited, which means the Zurbarán altarpieces and Murillo's religious canvases can be contemplated in near-silence. El Arenal neighborhood between the museum and the river is lined with the city's best tapas bars: Bodega Santa Cruz (always packed, always excellent), Taberna del Alabardero (in a stunning 19th-century townhouse), and the tapas bars around the Plaza del Cabildo. The afternoon is for the rooftop bar of the EME Catedral Hotel — directly facing the Giralda at eye level, with cocktails and the most dramatic hotel terrace view in Seville. Evening: book a private Sevillanas dance class (the local folk dance from which flamenco evolved) for a genuinely participatory Sevillano experience.

• ✦ Museo de Bellas Artes — Zurbarán and Murillo masterpieces in a former convent
• ✦ El Arenal tapas circuit
• ✦ EME Catedral Hotel rooftop — Giralda at eye level
• ✦ Sevillanas dance class for two

A final Seville morning should begin with breakfast at a traditional bar — tostada with aceite y tomate (toast rubbed with tomato and olive oil), a glass of fresh orange juice from Seville's own bitter orange trees, and a café con leche. The Seville orange — the famous bitter variety used in marmalade, Cointreau, and Grand Marnier — grows on thousands of trees lining the city streets, and in winter the orange harvest turns the pavements yellow. A final walk through the Barrio Santa Cruz, one more circuit of the Alcázar garden, or a visit to the Archivo de Indias — the archive of all Spanish colonial documentation from the 16th to 19th centuries, housed in a Renaissance palace between the cathedral and the Alcázar — before the short taxi to the airport. Seville is a city that gets under the skin quickly and lets go reluctantly.

• ✦ Final tostada con tomate breakfast at a neighborhood bar
• ✦ Last walk through the Barrio Santa Cruz
• ✦ Archivo de Indias — the records of the entire Spanish colonial empire
• ✦ Short taxi to Seville Airport SVQ