How I Get Around

Transport. It's something you have to think about when you need to move your body from the place where you are to another place which is a distance from where you are. It's also something that wasn't at the forefront of my mind living in the suburbs in Dublin. I got buses to college and town, I got taxis home from nights out, I walked the short distances and if the short distances weren't quite short enough on a given day I got a lift.

Here, however, I live in a city centre location (I have struggled in vain to think of an area of Dublin I could compare it to, the layout here is so different. You shall all have to visit me I suppose.) Most of the distances are short, and the ones that seem long aren't really, a half an hour's walk isn't much. To get to where I need to go, I use three forms of transport.

1) Bicicleta or Bicycle or Beeheecleha (Andalucian for Bicicleta, credit to Deirdre for that one).

I have very recently become a member of Sevici, Seville's city bike rental scheme. For 28 euro for a whole year you can have access to 2500 bikes which are located at over 200 parking stations. As long as your journey is under 30 minutes, which in central Seville they usually would be, each use is free. Lots of European cities have something like this, including Dublin, but you have to hand it to Seville for pulling it off so well. There are cycle lanes everywhere and its a very convenient and safe way to get around. Snaps for Ayuntamiento de Sevilla. The only disadvantage is the somewhat less than attractive appearance you might have when you arrive at your destination having cycled in 30 degree heat (It's still hot. Fingers crossed autumn arrives before winter, otherwise that's just confusing.) and the danger of arriving at a full station and having to find somewhere else to park your bike, which seems to happen a lot in the morning at the University.

bus ticket (pretty) and sevici card (functional)

2) Autobús or Bus (duh)

The bus system is pretty good in Seville, they run frequently and until the same time of night as in Dublin, with  I think a few more night buses. It's €1.30 for a single ticket regardless of where you're going, no need to pretend to be getting off at an earlier stop here, and you can also get bus cards (which the majority of people seem to use) for 10 journeys which are (I think) top-up-able (not a word) and which end up costing almost half the price for each journey. The problem I've encountered has been that the buses to some of the more far flung places I've needed to go to all leave from a more central location, such as near the University or on a main road. How do I get to these places? My favourite mode of transport of all...

3) Yo or Me
I walk. I walk a lot. I like walking. My shoes are going to be worn through by the time I get back to Ireland. Walking deserves its own post to be honest so I can talk about it at length. I cycle when I don't have time to walk, I get the bus when walking would take so long it would be impractical. Otherwise, it's me and my two feet.

I'm definitely writing a whole post about walking.