El Albaicin, La Alhambra, y la festividad de San Cecilio

Wow! It's been a week and 3 days since I first set foot in Granada, and life has been jam-packed with tours and new experiences and walking. Please excuse the blog pictures being missing for now....I'm opening a flickr account, as you may have noticed under study abroad pictures, and it's giving me some trouble.

As I mentioned, we toured el Albaicin, the old Moorish quarter of the city that leads to el Sacromonte, the gypsy quarters. In this area there are a lot of caves and buildings combined; it overlooks la Alhambra and the main part of the city. While it's perfectly safe during the day (especially in groups, which I've been in each time) I hear it's definitely better to be in a group at night in those parts. There are clubs and flamenco shows in this area; there are lots of houses built into the mountainside, and a few farms at the bottom with olive trees and more. 

Today was la festividad de San Cecilio, a festival for Granada's patron saint, during which all the residents of the city make a pilgrimage from la Plaza Nueva to a famous abbey in Sacromonte at the top of a small mountain. My landlady/"mom" of the residencia set me up with a hiking group that her brother leads on excursions in the area- not that the trip to the abbey was much of a hike- but we met early and walked through el Sacromonte to hiking trails at the other end of the valley, past the farms and houses and caves. I met a lot of Spaniards today!

la grupa

We eventually made our way back through floods of people to the festivities; from afar, I saw some flamenco dancers, and we made our way up the zig-zagging road to the abbey. Everyone pays tribute to their patron saint at the abbey by walking the catacombs where the tombs are...it was fascinating. After that, we went up to the very top of the mountain above the abbey and sunbathed a little and saw Granada and the Sierra Nevadas from the highest point. Fue incredible! 

The biggest piece of history in Granada, however, is la Alhambra. Meaning literally "red fortress," la Alhambra is an Arabian palace that clearly shows Granada's Moorish history from before la reconquista of monarchs Ferdinand and Isabelle in 1492. Situated on a small mountain overlooking the city and el Albaicin, la Alhambra is a series of gardens and buildings- a tiny city where the sultans and other rulers lived and reigned. The culture and designs are fantastic, in a word. They embody the Muslim faith with designs of nature, but they also subtly and psychologically hint through architecture and light that the sultan was second to God.

A separate section of la Alhambra featured gardens and a duck pond with a tower in it. There was a flock of peacocks there! It is really a wondrous place. There were lots of people reading and working and still using the gardens and courtyards of la Alhambra, as you only have to pay to see certain parts. I fully intend to make use of the space as well during my time here :) There's nothing like going to do homework in an ancient palace.