Tuesday, October 20, 2015 The Alhambra

Today marks our ultimate tourist day, anxiously awaited. For today we visit the Alhambra, actually the Palacios Nazaries, considered by many to be the most important tourist spot in Spain, if not all of Europe. I purchased our tickets online this past June, noting even then that many of the half-hour entrance time slots had already been taken.

The Alhambra complex itself lies at the top of the main hill, La Sabica, in Granada. For once bowing to temporal reality, we hire a cab to take us up to the hilltop. We join the line to pick up our tickets for the palace. Bird and I try to sit up near the front of the line awaiting our turn. A guard officiously insists that we get at the end of the line that has one person in it, namely Bloodroot. We join Bloodroot and the guard now believes we try to jump the queue, pushing Bloodroot aside. The guard begins fussing anew. At long last, Bloodroot looks at the guard and says “juntos” (meaning “together”). The man finally buzzes off. In due time, our turn at last arrives. We enter the kiosk to claim our all-important tickets, as required using the same credit card with which I made the initial purchase way back in June.

An immense line neighbors us for those without reservations, people who neglected to purchase prepaid tickets. Do they not read their guidebooks? Every book goes on and on about the number of people wishing to visit the Alhambra. The palace sells out daily, probably by 8 AM. By 9:30, the current time, all palace tickets long ago sold for today. This does not disperse the line or even, as far as I can tell, discourage its inhabitants. You need a different ticket to visit the rest of the complex. Perhaps they desire this or think that they’ll magically get a palace ticket. Reminds one of the old Grateful Dead shows with people begging for a “miracle” ticket.

The Alhambra actually consists of a bunch of things. The Moors built Palacios Nazaries or the alcazar (palace), the alcazaba (fortress), the Generalife gardens and a surrounding medina (city). Charles V erected an unfinished rotunda palace on the property.

In a bizarre twist of fate, we follow in Keith’s mom Jean’s footsteps. She toured the Alhambra in the early 1990s on an AARP tour. We have her tour book she bought here, still full of good info. Jean pronounced the Alhambra the best thing she visited in Spain. I never met Jean. She died young, ten years before I met Keith. But I relish her gentle shaping of his soul. I reach out to touch her spirit through the Alhambra.

For the most part, Europe and her attractions tend to be old. We forget the age of what we visit until something jolts us, be it someone’s guidebook or an old photo. I once saw a photo of my grandmother Carrie standing in front of the Eiffel Tower in the 1950s. We saw the selfsame tower in 2009. Our ancestors wanted to see the same things we do and as us, sometimes they pulled it off too.

Our tickets for the Palacios Nazaries permit entry between 10 and 10:30 AM. Bloodroot won’t listen to me, his beloved mother. Quelle surprise, eh? Deciding we must be physically at the palace by 10AM sharp, Bloodroot insists we run the fifteen minute walk to the entrance. Bloodroot charges ahead, blazing the path. Arriving at 9:50, we learn that the guards forbid entry until 10AM. Thus, arriving early only has cast us into another line.

The guards approach. They maneuver us ahead of the crowd, supplying a removable ramp to cover a set of steps, and set us near the palace entrance to wait. The crowd threatens to overflow, spilling past the line behind us. Like us, they’re forbidden entry prior to 10AM. We all wait, as the guards before the palace doors have machines that must say 10AM before they can stamp our tickets and open the doors.

10AM, here we go! The alcazar, or the sultan’s palace, formed the last stand facing the reconquista. We enter a dim, almost hushed space, mesmerized by the incredible tilework we find in the first room. 

The palace opens into bright light as we enter the first courtyard, the courtyard of the Myrtles. Hedges surround a swimming pool. The palace displays water, wealth in the Islamic world. Water gracefully flows everywhere, sparkling like gold, leaving us humbled by the sultan’s wealth.

From the courtyard, we access a more dimly lit room, the Grand Hall of the Ambassadors. Here, years ago, the sultan would receive you. As our eyes adjust, we see the perfect star covered ceiling and Arabic script everywhere. The room reverberates with history. We picture, almost unwillingly shoved back in time, the reconquista ending here. A bit later, Columbus talked Isabella into financing his voyage in the very same room.

We enter the next courtyard, the Courtyard of the Lions. Per the Rick Steves’ bible, the Jewish community gave the sultan the fountain with twelve lions, one for each tribe of Israel. Water splashes from each lion’s mouth. When the Christians conquered in 1492, they took apart the fountain to see how it worked. They weren’t smart enough to put it back together correctly, but did display the pieces. Fully restored in 2012, the fountain with its flowing water delights us.

While I commune with the Jewish lions, desperately trying to remember the name of even one tribe of Israel, the boys disappear into the sultan’s private rooms, sadly wheelchair inaccessible. Unfortunately, guards prevent the boys sneaking me and Bird into the forbidden area. Bear describes a maze filled with rooms, hallways and staircases bursting with intricately carved wood, filigreed windows filled with wavy thick glass. Peering through the glass produces an antique look to the world. Randomly, beautiful courtyards spring open when you descend one stair. “I also saw amazing private gardens, with a beautiful view across a ravine looking at a church,” rhapsodizes Bear.

Numerous rooms branch off of this courtyard, sadly inaccessible for me. The boys explore them all.

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Leaving the palace, we look for something to eat. Trapped once more in a tourist hell, we buy some amazingly bad sandwiches. We eat our crappy sandwiches while sitting outside overlooking a drop off into a lower inaccessible pavilion. We spot some really heavy cats. The cats own the place and have taken it over, but why are these feral cats so fat? Living the good life? Watching the other tourists and the cats, we see people throw the lousy sandwiches to the cats. Eschewing the bread parts, the cats eat the cheese and quasi-meaty parts. But they get so much food they can be picky, often leaving the tourist offerings untouched. Watching the cats forms the best part of the meal.

We eat enough of the quasi-sandwiches to stave off crazy hunger. Full enough to feed the cats too, we then toss our lunch remains (sadly most of it) and leave the stand of questionable sandwiches.

We next visit Charles V’s palace, a two-story circular open-air place. Thankfully, conquering Charles (grandson of Isabel & Ferdinand) built his palace next to, instead of on top of, the Palacio Nazaries. Charles’s son, Philip II, didn’t finish the palace, choosing instead to build El Escorial while leaving his dad’s place exposed to the elements. The place has perfect acoustics. Anything you say in the middle of the circle can be heard all around. The boys set me into the courtyard’s center. I begin to declaim Macbeth. For some reason, they hurriedly push me away, long before I finish.

We take a secret lift upstairs to find Oh God more art( a fine arts museum). I just can’t take any more art. Can you believe that I would ever even think that? Much less utter the statement? We walk around the courtyard and ask to go back downstairs. Keith resists, of course, sucked in by yet another art museum. We leave, ignoring his protests. We threaten to visit another church, bringing instant compliance with our wishes.

On to the fort that defended the city! From the bottom of the hill at the fort’s base, we peer into the fort, seeing a maze of steps, not at all accessible. We part ways with Bloodroot because he wants to see the fort. He promises to meet us right outside the gate of the gardens.

Now we wish to tour the fabled Generalife Gardens. Taking various paths, Keith and I wander through the gardens. Keith likes the olive trees, the pomegranates, and especially the view of the palace from the gardens. We encounter steps repeatedly preventing me from seeing much of the gardens. Keith parks Bird and I, then disappears down a cripple-forbidden path. He sees the Alhambra again, liking the view, as it occasionally pops up as an amazing background item.  Bloodroot actually eventually finds us. He expresses his disappointment in the fort. “Lots of steps. Not much to see.”  Following Bloodroot’s lead, we see another secret part of the gardens, as he takes us on a step free tour.

Gardened and palaced out, we make to depart. As we learned from the morning taxi ride, the palace complex sits upon the tallest hill in town. As we all know, the high ground is priceless militarily. Leaving, we decide to walk down the tour bus road. Rounding the first bend, I spot two Roma with fists full of rosemary standing at the base of stairs descending directly from the Alhambra. I believe I watch them discuss, rosemary waving about, how they will perpetrate their scam on the people walking down the stairs. I also believe the Roma consider wheelchairs unlucky. Unlike prior wheelchair-free trips, on this one no Roma approach us. For what it’s worth, the rosemary scam involves a gypsy (Roma) aggressively pushing a sprig of rosemary on you then demanding five euros compensation as coins are unlucky. The bible warns us of this. We see a good bit less of the scam than we had expected, perhaps because by October the main tourist season has ended.

Leaving the stairs behind, walking downhill, we see how incredibly clever the Moors were with water. Old, very old, tile lined courses next to the road easily handle all the water coming off the hill. The roadway, tree lined and green, feels more gardeny than the official gardens. We watch the water dart here and there, under the road at times. It’s still summer here. We walk under a green leafy place. Eventually, we come to an archway. We enter the city through a gate again finding ourselves on the outskirts of the Albayzin.

The boys know our location. Left to my own devices, I would wander witless and die. We wander slowly back to our flat. Our last official day of vacation ends with the group too tired to cook. We stop to eat our dinner at a place called Abades Paco Martin. We are the only customers in the huge restaurant, never a good sign. Apparently adept at feeding large tour groups, the mediocre food does fill us up. We return to our flat and turn in for the night.