Pamplona Cathedral

It's a cautious cathedral. That what I think first as I sit down at the back of the nave and look around. It's tall, yes, I it's graceful, linear pointed arches processing down the nave to the gated apse. But the windows set in the upper half are small, hesitant. Colorful, but only half as big as they should be in a High Gothic cathedral. The rose window too. Then I read and discover that a church as stood here since 76 when Pompey founded the city, and four or five have already fallen. The builders, starting in 1393, wanted their church to last. It gave their design an element of caution. 

The rulers of Navarre are Buried near the altar, unique marble statues from the 15th c, surrounded by French pleureurs. I'm most drawn to the one who reads and hides her face. 

I've never been totally alone in a cathedral before. It gives it an element of privacy and amazing silence. My cathedral. 

The cloister is silent and sunny, gothic in design, really commendable in its symmetry. Above the door to the refectory is a gothic relief of the passion cycle. Truly splendid refectory, with figures at the base of the springing vaults, all still painted. Beside it a kitchen with four chimneys and light from an oculus atop a tall triangular roof. And beneath? Roman ruins and a long history pilgrimage. Strange exhibits with shadow puppets on the walls and wifi. Funny how the modern and the ancient can mix.