{"id":37683,"date":"2020-02-22T01:39:09","date_gmt":"2020-02-22T06:39:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.runkevinrun.com\/?p=37683"},"modified":"2020-02-22T01:39:58","modified_gmt":"2020-02-22T06:39:58","slug":"february-21-2020-a-walk-to-the-expo-and-plaza-de-espana","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/runkevinrun.com\/?p=37683","title":{"rendered":"February 21, 2020 \u2013 A Walk To The Expo\u2026 and Plaza de Espa\u00f1a"},"content":{"rendered":"

The other night over tapas, Tomas told Susana and me that the marathon expo was too far to walk and that we should take the metro \u2013 it would be no more than 15 minutes.<\/p>\n

I walked.<\/p>\n

It wasn\u2019t because I was cheap \u2013 it was because I\u2019m a runner.\u00a0 And walking the city seemed like an opportunity to see other things along the way.\u00a0 And I didn\u2019t have anything else on my agenda.<\/p>\n

So I walked.<\/p>\n

It took about an hour which didn\u2019t seem too bad to me.<\/p>\n

The expo was held at the Palacio Congresos y Exposiciones de Sevilla, also known as FIBES.\u00a0 How they got FIBES out of that name I\u2019m not entirely clear on but a quick google search returns THIS:<\/p>\n

The Conference and Exhibition Centre of Seville<\/strong> (Spanish: Palacio de Congresos y Exposiciones de Sevilla<\/em>), usually referred to as FIBES<\/strong> or Fibes<\/strong>, is a conference and exhibition centre in Seville, Andalusia, Spain. The centre consists of two buildings, FIBES I and FIBES II, which are connected by a footbridge. \u2013 Wikipedia<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\"\"<\/a> \"\"<\/a> \"\"<\/a>\u00a0\"\"<\/a> \"\"<\/a> \"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

When picking up my bib, after telling them my number and the volunteer finding the bib, she asked for my ID\u2026 and I pointed to my jacket.\u00a0 Worked ok.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a> \"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The expo itself was your typical \u201ccome run our marathon\u201d and \u201ccome buy the latest running gear\u201d with the occasional \u201ccheck out this snake oil\u2026 er, nutritional wonderfood!\u201d\u00a0 I was adrift though as it was all in Spanish\u2026 as it should be.\u00a0 When vendors started talking to me and I said the one phrase in Spanish I\u2019ve mastered, \u201cLo siento\u2026 mi espanol is muy mal.\u00a0 Has mas anos de estudiar.<\/em>\u201d\u00a0 [Translation\u2026 I *think*\u2026 \u201cI\u2019m sorry\u2026 my Spanish is terrible.\u00a0 It\u2019s been many years since I studied.\u201d]\u00a0 They would smile and take back whatever literature or demo they had handed me.\u00a0 The only one I really regretted was the Hop On Hop Off Bus pen and t-shirt.\u00a0 But that booth did tell me I could get a free ticket on the bus\u2026 not here but if I went to the main shop in the City Center.\u00a0 So that\u2019s what I\u2019ll do on Saturday.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a> \"\"<\/a> \"\"<\/a> \"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Funny story \u2013 I bumped into Susana from my tapas tour.\u00a0 I was walking out and she was walking in. All we kept talking about were glory days \u2013 food gone in a wink of an eye.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

We parted ways and I hoofed it back to the City Center to get my free Hop On Hope Off bus ticket.\u00a0 But first I wandered past the El Cid statue.\u00a0 I felt it lacked the chiseled gravitas of Chuck Heston.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a> \"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

It\u2019s low season in Sevilla because I guess it\u2019s currently their 2-3 weeks of winter.\u00a0 That means the morning is slightly brisk at 55 degrees Fahrenheit but when the sun rises it\u2019s a very pleasant 70 degrees.\u00a0 It\u2019s bright and cheery.\u00a0 And there aren\u2019t a lot of tourists walking about (though still too many for my tastes\u2026 I guess I\u2019m looking for more of a Post-Apocalypse kind of crowd).\u00a0 I made my way to the Plaza de Espa\u00f1a.\u00a0 Once again, we go to the internet:<\/p>\n

The Plaza de Espa\u00f1a is a plaza in the Parque de Mar\u00eda Luisa, in Seville, Spain, built in 1928 for the Ibero-American Exposition of 1929. It is a landmark example of the Regionalism Architecture, mixing elements of the Baroque Revival, Renaissance Revival and Moorish Revival styles of Spanish architecture. \u2013 Wikipedia<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Gosh, it was a wonder to behold.\u00a0 Again, with it being not so crowded, one could just\u2026 be\u2026 in the open plaza.\u00a0 There were boats you could rent to row around the roaring 20s designed lazy river.\u00a0 A flamenco exhibition busker team had set up a performance under one of the acoustically marvelous archways.\u00a0 Elsewhere a guy with a saxophone and a gal singer were crooning a medley that veered from \u201cBeauty and the Beast\u201d to \u201cMy Way.\u201d\u00a0 Horse drawn carriages and SegWays circled the fountain.\u00a0 And I decided to sit a spell and read a book in the sun.\u00a0 It most assuredly did not suck (the place\u2026 it\u2019s too early to tell on the book).<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a> \"\"<\/a> \"\"<\/a> \"\"<\/a> \"\"<\/a> \"\"<\/a> \"\"<\/a> \"\"<\/a> \"\"<\/a> \"\"<\/a> \"\"<\/a> \"\"<\/a> \"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

I felt a little guilty about siestaing<\/em> with a book or a tv show instead of seeing more and more local sights.\u00a0 I texted my brother at dinner saying as much: \u201cI\u2019m both enjoying and not enjoying Sevilla.\u00a0 It would be more fun with somebody else but I\u2019m a tough traveling companion.\u00a0 I\u2019m feeling a little guilty not touring more as I’m sitting outside having gorged myself on more tapas, drinking another glass of wine which is cheaper than water and reading a book.\u00a0 But there’s only so much history you can absorb, ya know?\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>\u00a0\"\"\u00a0<\/a>\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

And so why not go all in and slothful and gluttonous and cap the night with gelato?\u00a0 I even splurged, paying an extra euro for the two scoop cup.\u00a0 Belgian Chocolate and Kinder if you\u2019re looking for the flavor profile:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a> \"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Hey, look — a cartoon-y filter!<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Man… I really need to start thinking about this race.\u00a0 I guess Sunday is still two days away… well, a day and a wake-up.\u00a0 I bet Susana is all set.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The other night over tapas, Tomas told Susana and me that the marathon expo was too far to walk and that we should take the metro \u2013 it would be no more than 15 minutes. I walked. It wasn\u2019t because I was cheap \u2013 it was because I\u2019m a runner.\u00a0 And walking the city seemed […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-37683","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/runkevinrun.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37683","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/runkevinrun.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/runkevinrun.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/runkevinrun.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/runkevinrun.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=37683"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/runkevinrun.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37683\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/runkevinrun.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=37683"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/runkevinrun.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=37683"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/runkevinrun.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=37683"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}