Our third day in Seville we decided to explore the Plaza de España. Built of the 1928 for the 1929 Ibero-American Exposition, it is one of the largest and ranked one of the most impressive plazas in Europe. They have also filmed several movies there, including one of the Star Wars, a definite selling point for at least one of us. We meandered though the beautiful Maria Luisa Park that surrounds the Plaza, enjoying the many fountains, mature trees from all over the world, and birds, and getting peeks of the towers of the Plaza. Suddenly it popped out of the trees and it did not disappoint. It opens up to a massive, half-circular plaza with a building outlining the edge, towers at each end, and a canal between the semi-circular plaza and building, and several bridges crossing the canal. Horses and carts park alongside the Plaza and wait for fares, trotting them through the Plaza and out into the city. This spectacle is joined by boats rowing through the canal, musicians, Flamenco dancers, and other street performers. We decided to get in line to row a boat through the canal first. As we waited we began chatting and found the gal in front of us was from Cuba but living in London for the past 12 years. She and her boyfriend were visiting her sister and brother-in-law and their children who live in Seville. The sister confided in me at one point that the boyfriend was going to propose in the boats. I told her we would take some photos and videos to share if we could. The sister’s family got in one boat, and she and her boyfriend got into another. Once in our boat, Griffin began rowing us along, getting the hang of the oars while bumping into the other boats (to be fair, we were by far both the only ones bumping into others). We watched for signs that the proposal would happen and rowed along. Unfortunately he decided to propose when our boat was between the their’s and the sister’s family’s boat, so I videoed as much as I could and Darrell took photos. The sister’s children had made signs to hold up. It was a really sweet moment and lovely proposal and I was glad we could at least be sure it was captured for them. And she said yes, whew! The happy couple continued to row along, cuddling and glowing. I shared the photos and videos with the sister and we all felt lucky to be part of a special moment in their lives. Our kids took turns rowing and complaining that the boat rise was too long, with Larkin scheming about how to get out early. Ha!
Once we finished with the boats, we raced across the beautifully-decorated bridge and headed toward the Flamenco dancers and music. They put on a passionate show which we enjoyed. We headed further along the circle to where we heard violin music and found a young man playing an electric violin. We climbed the stairs to the second floor and enjoyed the view of the plaza and park while listening to him play. He let G hold the instrument to see how heavy it was. The plaza building is lined with ceramic tiles murals that each represent a Spanish province. We found ours, Pontevedra, and took a photo by it. L was antsy to play, so we found a playground to enjoy for awhile. We had other areas we wanted to explore, but legs were tired by this point, after about 5 miles of walking, so we headed back to the apartment and settled in for a mellow evening.
