Bricks of Segovia

Spain has a knack for building things that last. Cathedrals, empires, grudges. And in Segovia, it all comes together in stone, mortar and defiance of gravity.

The Roman aqueduct slashes through the city like a scar from another lifetime. Nearly 2 000 years old and still standing tall. No mortar, no glue, just brute engineering and sheer Roman arrogance. 14 kilometers of stone once brought water to the city with a one-percent grade of slope. I walk beneath the arches and don’t just feel the history, I feel the weight of it pressing down, reminding me who was here first.

The aqueduct of Segovia.

But there is more. The cathedral stabs the sky with Gothic spires like a divine middle finger to minimalism. It was built around 1525, after the original was destroyed in a fire. But despite being constructed during the Renaissance, it still has a very Gothic touch to it.

Segovia cathedral.

Then there’s the Alcázar. Dramatically perched on top of a cliff, it’s part fairy tale and part fortress. Looking like the grandmother of Neuschwanstein, it is rumored to have inspired Walt Disney to the castle of Snow White.

Alcazar of Segovia.

I enter the castle by the draw-bridge across the chasm, swiftly making my way to the room where Columbus met with Ferdinand and Isabella on his return. From the windows I see what the kings of old saw. Endless plains, the sweep of old Castile and the bones of stories buried in the hills. Even Hemingway’s book “For Whom the Bell Tolls” from 1940 takes place in the mountains near Segovia.

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