Day 1 and 2: Córdoba

It was mid-February 2016 and my Erasmus in Madrid was almost over. I'd just finished with my exams and I spent two good weeks simply doing nothing, given that I'd paid rent for my room for up til the 1st of March.

I knew that in the last few days my friend from Italy was coming to spend a little time with me, and to help with my luggage, so I'd promised myself that I'd make use of the available time to have a lovely trip, as one should.

The destination was vague (Andalusia) and the travel companions too (I was with a the friend of a flatmate of one of my friends), but it didn't really matter. I just wanted to go somewhere new, so I made the arrangements with this girl and we left on our adventure one cold, wintry Monday morning.

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To begin with, an early start was necessary (around 6:15am if I remember correctly), which was followed by a slalom through the dark streets of La Latina with all my luggage, in order to catch the green metro line to the Carabanchel stop. There I would find Daniela, the other girl, and the guy who we'd booked a BlaBla Car with the previous evening.

It was the first time I tried BlaBla Car, so the idea of going in the car of a stranger was a bit worrying. In reality, I immediately found it very good. The guy was nice and the two hour journey went by quickly, also because I was collapsed from exhaustion. The service is very reliable: instantly upon booking a car they provide you with a code that you'll give to the driver once the journey has finished, with which he can collect his money. In all seriousness: if the driver doesn't turn up or, worse, they're a speed demon, you can always refuse to pay them. The price along makes a mockery of what you'd be spending if you were travelling by train or other methods of transport. If you want a low cost trip, with various stops along the way, it's a comfortable and super convenient option in my opinion.

We arrived at Cordoba around 11am. It took some time to find the hostel, given that we were fumbling around through the tiredness.

The place was located in one of the many alleys of the centre near the Mosque and, to tell you the truth, it wasn't the biggest. On the other hand, we each paid something like €12 for the room, so we weren't exactly expecting 5 stars. Also, as we waited to deposit our luggage, I was really struck by the typically Andalusian structure of the hostel's indoor patio area. It was a kind of garden with a fountain, plants and coloured tiles, surrounded by a building with more floors; each floor overlooked the patio below through arches, whilst the upper part was covered with a kind of canvas sheet.

A little while after checking in, we had some tapas for lunch on a little table outside, after which we took a walk around the city. From the beginning it was all quite improvised, we had a real map with us, so we went wherever the wind took us, so to speak.

We crossed the Roman Bridge, which passed over the Guadalquivir, took a turn around the city walls, explored a garden with palm and orange trees, and admired the remains of an Ancient Roman column within a square.

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I must confess that Córdoba surprised me more than I thought it would. Every angle, every Moorish-style facade left me entranced. I had some preconceived notions of Andalusia and its culture, but experiencing it first hand is something else. It was a completely different Spain from that in which I'd lived in the previous 4½ months: the Arabic influence was very strong and I felt almost as if I'd found myself in a dream suspended in time.

There were religious shrines all throughout the city, walls decorated with coloured tiles and little patios, with which I instantly fell in love. The Juderìa, the old Hebrew district located behind the mosque, is quite something. Some of the streets are super narrow, the walls of the very white houses are often decorated with blue vases of red geraniums (seen in any way as the alley of flowers). Almost all the small internal gardens have mosaics, small arches and fountains, other than the flowers and plants that are sort of everywhere. The air one breathes here makes you feel light years away from Madrid.

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The first, and also the second, day, we were literally lost in the streets and courtyards of Córdoba, something I advise doing if you're going to visit the city for the first time. The centre isn't huge, so it's easily traversed on foot.

I also suggest visiting the San Bartolomeo Chapel (now the College of Letters and Philosophy of the university), the most important churches (San Paolo, San Lorenzo) and the Plaza de la Corredera, which we'd only seen in passing.

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Our day ended in a tapas bar, but then concluded itself at around 11pm in the hostel. At that time the streets and squares were eerily quiet and there were few people outside. Córdoba in effect, was not a nocturnal city, and it's rather relaxed for those looking for fun, bars and music all night long. This didn't matter much to us, as we were both dead tired.

We dedicated the following morning to visiting the Mezquita (or the big mosque), a towering Islamic cathedral from the 7th Century, and to the Alcàzar de los Reyes Cristianos, a palace-fortress built on behalf of the King Alfonso XI. It goes without saying that we enjoyed both visits. The mosque seemed huge and very unique, certainly different to the religious structures that we were used to seeing. The Alcàzar gardens were wonderful with their orange trees, hedges, fish ponds and surrounding stone sculptures.

Both the sunny days and the atmosphere were so unusual, but looking back I feel like Córdoba was the Andalusian city that struck me the most.

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We committed the afternoon to the last destination of the city, that is the Palacio de Viana, palace-museum of the ancient nobility of Córdoba. We only wanted to visit its twelve courtyards, instead of the indoor rooms. Whatever decision you make, it's a highly recommended stop.

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Unfortunately, the remaining part of the afternoon was spent doing a desperate search for a hotel, hostel or any kind of accommodation to spend two nights in the city of Seville. We didn't have an exact idea of how we'd make the trip: the intention was to just leave and "stay and see", deciding in the moment where we'd go. We were sat on a table in a bar with WiFi, and once we'd decided that the next stop would be Seville, we starting looking on Booking.com and comparing the best prices on my tablet.

I didn't want to leave everything to the last minute, so we were on the spur of the moment, and a bit anxious for fear of not finding anything and not knowing where we'd be spending the night.

At the end it was all resolved for the better, so with our suitcases we took a bus from the terminal of Córdoba and we left for the capital of Andalusia.

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