Seville Cathedral and La Giralda

When the canons of Seville decided in 1401 to replace the city's old mosque with a cathedral, they reportedly resolved to build a church so large that those who saw it would think them mad. They succeeded. Seville Cathedral is the largest Gothic cathedral in the world, a forest of piers and vaults so vast that the eye struggles to take it in, and it is one of the three buildings, with the Alcázar and the Archivo de Indias, that make up Seville's UNESCO World Heritage Site. Two parts of the old mosque survive and frame the visit. The Patio de los Naranjos, the Courtyard of the Orange Trees, was the ablutions court, and its fountain and rows of trees still give a sense of the mosque that stood here. And the Giralda, the bell tower that defines Seville's skyline, began life in the twelfth century as the Almohad minaret, sister to the towers of Marrakech and Rabat; the Christians kept it, and in the sixteenth century Hernán Ruiz crowned it with a Renaissance belfry topped by a bronze weathervane, the Giraldillo, which gives the tower its name. Inside, the scale is overwhelming. The main altarpiece, the Retablo Mayor, is a wall of gilded carved wood with scenes from the life of Christ, one of the largest in Christendom and the life's work of generations of carvers. The tomb of Christopher Columbus is carried shoulder-high by four heralds representing the old kingdoms of Spain. Side chapels hold paintings by Murillo, Zurbarán and Goya, the sacristies hold treasures of silver and relics, and the chapter house has an elliptical dome of rare elegance. Then comes the climb: thirty-odd gently sloping ramps, built so that a rider on horseback could reach the top, lead up the Giralda to the bell chamber and views over the rooftops to the Alcázar and the river.

The general ticket covers the Cathedral, the climb of the Giralda and admission to the Church of El Salvador, Seville's second-largest church and a Baroque gem in its own right a few minutes north, so keep the ticket. Buying online is cheaper than at the ticket office and the official site recommends it, since capacity is limited and demand is high; online ticket holders enter at the Puerta del Lagarto, while the ticket office is at the Puerta del Príncipe. Reduced rates apply to seniors and students, children up to thirteen enter free with an adult, and an audio guide or the official app is worth having to make sense of the chapels. The Cathedral opens for visits from late morning to early evening Monday to Saturday and from mid-afternoon on Sundays, around services, and hours can change for worship and ceremonies, so check the agenda. On Sundays a limited number of free tickets are issued in person late in the afternoon.

Guided options add a lot here. Rooftop tours take small groups across the roofs and terraces among the flying buttresses and pinnacles, with close-up views of the Giralda; they sell out and are worth booking as soon as your dates are fixed. Other guided visits focus on the stained glass, the archbishops' tombs or the Cathedral by night. Dress respectfully, as in any working church: shoulders and knees covered is the safe rule, and hats off inside.

A route that works: enter and walk the length of the nave first to grasp the scale, then go to the Retablo Mayor and the Royal Chapel, then the tomb of Columbus by the south door. Climb the Giralda while you still have energy, ideally before midday in summer, and then visit the sacristies and chapter house. Finish in the Patio de los Naranjos and leave through the Puerta del Perdón, the old mosque gate. With the Alcázar across the square, you can see Seville's two great monuments in a single morning — book the Alcázar for the first slot and the Cathedral for late morning, or the reverse in summer. In the evening, come back to the Plaza Virgen de los Reyes to see the Giralda floodlit, and in spring, when the orange trees blossom, the whole square is scented with azahar.