Tourist in my own town: the Tudela cathedral

This week I decided to take advantage of my free afternoon (instead of taking a 3 hour siesta which was my other option) and visit one place in Tudela I haven´t seen yet: the cathedral. The cathedral is the definining piece of Tudela´s skyline. Everywhere you go, It seems I´ve spent months know looking at this building from every possible angle except for inside!

From the puente romano, the bridge over the Ebro River

From the streets of Tudela

From the Torre Monreal, on top of a hill overlooking the city

From the statue of Jesús, on a hill on the other side of the city

From the Plaza Vieja, just outside the cathedral

And from the main entrance to the cathedral

I´ve seen a LOT of cathedrals at this point, so it takes a lot to impress me. And though the Tudela cathedral feels very small-town, and is clearly not on the same level as Toledo, Santiago, Sevilla, it made up for it in other ways.  I´m used to visiting cathedrals that are full of tourists. I was the only one in the Tudela cathedral, though, except for two nuns who were cleaning some of the altars when I first arrived! It was incredible for me that little old Tudela has such a beautiful cathedral, since you certainly couldn´t find anything like this in Durham or Atkinson or any other place I´ve called home!

The best part of the cathedral was the Capilla de Santa Ana. It felt like its own separate church, since it was huge and also constructed in a completely different style than the rest of the cathedral, with a huge baroque dome. It was beautiful.

I also visited the Museo de Tudela, a museum dedicated to the history of Tudela. It was really just a hodge-podge of random stuff from Tudela, but it was interesting to see archaeological Stone Age artefacts found right here, and to see the history of my new home laid out in a linear fashion.

Fun facts I learned:

• The area around Tudela has been inhabited for thousands and thousands of years, including by the Celtic people (same ones who were in Ireland).
• It only took the Moors three years to conquer up til Tudela. This seemed so quick for me, especially standing in a room that had thousands of years worth of artifacts, but I guess three years actually isn´t that short. 
• The bridge in Tudela is over a thousand years old! and was originally built by the Moors and was a pretty big deal since it was the only way across the river for kilometers in either mile (all the way to Logroño or Zaragoza).
• The cathedral wasn´t renovated until 2002, and they actually discovered a lot during the renovations about the mosque that was previously located where the cathedral now and found skeletons and graves beneath the church. Crazy to see information printed on the signs and displays and know that just 10 years ago, nobody knew about that!
• There was a castle in Tudela and the kings of Navarra used to live there until King Carlos made them destroy it (same guy who destroyed part of the Alhambra to build his palace inside it).