Our Airbnb host is awesome, even though she’s not in the country! She wrote is a very detailed email outlining at the things to do and see while we are here and even a comprehensive list of places to eat. One of those places was called El Rinconcillo and was very close to our hotel so we made that our first stop after putting a load of washing on.
When we arrived we got seated in the small dining area at the back of the restaurant and checked out the menu, luckily there was an English version too! Our waiter did not speak a word of English and was very busy which made it a bit hard to order but with Google translate we managed to get him to recommend a fish dish that was not too strong. We ended up ordering our first Jamon Iberico, which is the famous ham in Spain, croquetas, sea bass (I think) and a smoked salmon and tomato salad. The food was pretty good and much more lighter than we have been eating so far on this trip!
Here is the information provided to us from our great host:
Typical Andalusian Oldest bar in Seville dating back to 1670, and if you visit just one place in Santa Catalina, make it here! The current owners are on their 8th generation dating back to 1800 or so. You can never enter without seeing a tourist, so don’t expect that great discovery: an off the beaten path tapas bar. El Rinconcillo has a positively wonderful atmosphere, including a museum-like collection of (still full) bottles of liquor, some as old as 70 - 80 years. They say representatives from the liquor companies visit every so often to try and buy the older bottles - but they’re not parting with them. A new addition is a more elegant dining room upstairs in the old employee sleeping quarters, which offers complete restaurant service. Downstairs is almost all tapas and raciones as you slide up to the bar or one of the large barrels. Two small dining areas at the back offer a quick dinner (no tapas). Despite the fame, the food is cheap - tapas range in price from 1,60 - 3 €. Some of the coldest beer in town as well as the normal bar offerings: fino, vino dulce and a strange house wine. I would go there during the day if you have time.
After a nice lunch we decided to go for a big walking tour of Seville based on all the information from our host.
The streets are pretty cool around here, a lot of them are really small cobblestone roads with just enough space for one car, the buildings have a really nice and colourful look and feel and the street signs are normally decorative tiles on the side of the buildings. It’s also pretty quiet which makes walking through the towns really relaxing.
The first stop on the list was Catedral de Sevilla, which was pretty big! We didn’t go inside but we did walk half way around it and stopped to look at a few shops along the way. We did buy some nice chocolate covered nuts as snacks too.
From there we walked towards Alcazar de Sevilla but the queue to get on was really long and we didn’t really want to wait that long so we just continued to stroll around the gardens instead.
Eventually we came across a nice little cafe in the middle of the gardens and stopped for a drink. We ended up spending a bit of time here just enjoying the weather and taking a break from walking.
Here is what our host had to say about it:
You will have to walk around Barrio Santa Cruz. It is the most picturesque and delightful part of the city, with narrow winding cobbled streets and whitewashed houses.
One of my favourite things to do in Seville is to walk from the cathedral through Barrio Santa Cruz, getting lost in the maze of improbably narrow alleys, to Jardines de Murillo. From there to Plaza de España! One of the major attractions in Sevilla. Gorgeous building with paintings and maps about provinces in Spain. It is worth taking 1-2 hours enjoy this beautiful architecture and the park. Great photo opportunities.
A beautiful walk, I can guarantee you that you will love it! Walk around Parque Maria Luisa is very nice indeed
From here we just continued walking through the park. This area is a really nice place to walk around, not overly crowded compared to some cities and lots of nice parks and plenty of historic monuments to stop and admire.
The next place we wanted to go was called Triana, we walked along the river until we arrived at Puente de Triana, the bridge to Triana. This was also recommended up is by Rocio, our just and is where she grew up! There is normally a market here but it was closed by the time we got here however there was a nice strip of shops just as you enter the main town.
We had a few places to try for dinner but most of them didn’t open until 8:30pm which meant we had a bit over an hour to kill. We had been taking about churros and then happened to come across a churros shop with lots of people out the front, always a good sign! We ended up buying 5 churros with chocolate and she made them fresh for us right there and then! They were fairly different to the ones I’ve eaten in Melbourne, there seem bigger and more fluffy inside, they were delicious!
After looking around for a bit we made our way away from the hustle and bustle and into the quieter suburban streets. There was a restaurant tucked away in here that Rocio spoke quite highly of called Puratasca.
The risotto was really nice but before the beef cheeks arrived Bec was feeling pretty unwell and we ended up cancelling that last dish. The waitress was really nice, she was very understanding, helped us translate and then called a taxi for us to go home which otherwise would have been a 40 minute walk!
It’s been a long day but we’ve had great weather and seen a lot on our home made tour. We’ve done a lot of walking today but it seems much easier after Positano! It was home to bed now.