Horse carriage and tapas in Santa Cruz

First the wide avenues from a carriage. Then the narrow streets on foot, with a glass in your hand.

The carriage comes first. Your own carriage, not a shared one, through the parts of Seville built to be seen at that pace: the Plaza de España, the gardens of María Luisa, past the cathedral and the Torre del Oro, the tobacco factory that is now the university. The horses set the speed and there is nothing to do but look.

Then you step down and the city changes scale. Santa Cruz was the Jewish quarter, and the streets were made narrow on purpose — for shade, and to keep the summer out. From the carriage you saw the monuments; here you see the doorways, the patios behind the grilles, the tiles, the orange trees. Nothing in this quarter is more than a few minutes from anything else.

We stop for tapas in the bars people from the barrio actually use, standing at the counter the way it is done, one or two dishes at each. Hand-cut Iberian ham, cheese from the sierra, a cold fino or a glass of Andalusian wine, and whatever the house is known for. Between stops the history comes out — why the quarter looks the way it does, what stood there before, and how the food ended up the way it is.

The whole thing is private and moves at your pace. It works as an afternoon or an early evening, it is a good first day in Seville, and it is the version couples tend to choose for an anniversary or a proposal. If you want the tapas to become a proper dinner at the last stop, or the carriage to take you somewhere specific, tell us and we plan it that way.