27 October 2013

Bars that date back to the early 20th century - La Bodega Mariano Camacho

La Bodega Mariano Camacho is a wine bar worth a visit when in Seville, during the snail season in particular. It's probably one on the best places in Seville to enjoy an appetizer (tapa) of snails (caracoles) seasoned with a spicy peppery flavour and richly served on a saucer. Another of the attractions of this bar you can not miss is its beer. The beer is always excellently cooled down to serving temperature and poured with care and attention. The fame of pouring perfect beer and serving Seville's best snails means this bar is usually pretty full, especially in the summer, but don't let that deter you from going - the waiters are fast.

Stew of snails and beer. Photos by Association Apoloybaco

Notwithstanding its evident antiquity, the narrow streets of the old town of Seville still provide an ample selection of modernised bars and cafés with trendy bar equipment and new décor in contemporary colours and classic lines, but La Bodega Mariano Camacho isn't interested in any of that, choosing instead to play the card of all the grace of an old bar. 

Old floor of the bar. Photo by Susanne Vogel

It has this uneven ceramic floor typical in older-style bars, particularly in unrenovated buildings. Your bill is written in chalk right on the bar counter. You have to use the almost nonexistent ladies' room with only a curtain to it, no door, and you have to ask the waiters to let you pass by the bar to enter it.

Interior of the bar. Photo by Association Apoloybaco

A real old time feel here. You can tell the interior has remained virtually unchanged over a long period of time, for more than hundred years. La Bodega Mariano Camacho is a symbol of the bars' Seville from the early twentieth century to the present day. It resides in a characteristic 18th-century house-palace located in the Pumarejo Square (Plaza de Pumarejo), in Seville's old town (Casco Antiguo) neighbourhood of San Gil.

View to the bar from the Pumarejo Square. Photo by Yelp Search

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