June 23: Andalucia - Cordoba

Most people come to Cordoba to visit La Mezquita (the Great Mosque) in the city centre. And it's worth it. But there are a lot of things to see in Cordoba - the small, narrow streets of the Jewish Quarter which run and change direction without warning and without signposts. If you can find it, the Calle de Flores (Street of Flowers) is always a favourite with tourists, but there are lots of magical alleys and walkways which contain many wonderful things to see in this clear light.

My guide book on Andalucia tells me that many a Western traveller has come to Cordoba and found the Mezquita to be devoid of any spiritually. I disagree. After queuing with hundreds of others noisly outside in the intense white heat for almost an hour, we were permitted entry into the silent, cold shadows at around three o'clock. There was a vast mix of people, nationalities, colours, languages and religious backgrounds. Together we entered through a single doorway into another place.

The twilight of silence that met us overcame the vast majority of people, scything them down in an instant, reducing many to tears. I've never seen anything or experienced anything like it in my life. People walking around in circles of bewilderment looking up at such a sacred place of beauty, with mouths wide open, hands over their hearts and tears rolling freely down their faces. Their eyes transfixed at the creation of something so touching, so beautiful.

When eyes eventually became accustomed to the dusk of light in the Mezquita, I saw so many people wandering over to a seat or a bench to sit down and attempt to digest what they were experiencing. But it will probably take weeks or months for the mind to understand what the spirit learns in an instant. Certain feelings are difficult to describe, almost impossible. How can you say what it is to be seduced by a harmony which draws you closer in order to make you feel very small, before a rush of connection to a far greater knowing leaves you short of breath and bereft of understanding. Full understanding will never be known. But you become aware that perhaps a more simplistic method of pure acceptance is the key. Accepting that places like the Mezquita still exist, can still remind us that we are more than people going through the habitual motions of our life. The Mezquita serves to remind us that we are all creations of beauty from acts of beauty, and perhaps then, we have no greater moral obligation than to create beauty in our own lives.

I am sitting on my tour bus, riding onwards to Granada. The bus is very quiet. People are lost in their own thoughts. The fields that have been baked all day in the sun speed past our windows. Shades of gold, green, tangerine and burnt black pass. The road is long and runs on ahead over the smooth shapes that look like sand dunes. The sky is chrystalline blue. The sun is high. Ever get the feeling that things won't ever be the same again? Andalucia is casting spells over many people today. Some things won't change though, my stomach is rumbling and I'm hungry. Another hour to Granada, then I can eat. Till then, eyes closed and time to drift off elsewhere and dream of girls with big, brown almond eyes, round and soft