Attractions

Madrid:

As the capital of Spain, Madrid is a city of great cultural and political importance. While Madrid possesses a modern infrastructure, it has preserved the look and feel of many of its historic neighborhoods and streets. Its landmarks include the Royal Palace; the Teatro Real (Royal Theatre) with its restored 1850 Opera House; the Buen Retiro park; the imposing 19th-century National Library; and three superb art museums: the Prado Museum, the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, a museum of modern art, and the Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum, housed in the renovated Villahermosa Palace.

Prado Museum From its privileged location surrounded by trees and some of Madrid’s greatest monuments, the National Museum of the Prado is one of the most visited attractions in the capital. The museum is home to the most important Spanish painting collection in the world.

Royal Palace Discover the new painting gallery, with works by Velazquez, Goya, Caravaggio, Corolla and Juan de Flandes Home to the Kings of Spain from Carlos III all the way through to Alfonso XIII, Madrid’s Royal Palace is now open to anyone who wants to take a trip through Spanish history. Visitors can wander through the many rooms, enjoying the beautiful architecture and the art collection still housed here. Though it is no longer the current royal family’s home, it is still their official residence and the place where public acts and official ceremonies are held.

Parque del Buen Retiro literally "Gardens" or "Park of the Pleasant Retreat") is a large and popular 1.4 km² (350 acre) park in Madrid's city center, very near the Puerta de Alcalá and not far from the Museo del Prado. Once outside Madrid, the park is now entirely surrounded by the present day city.
The park was originally the site of a royal palace (Alcazar) built in 1632 under the reign of King Philip IV. Most of the palace was destroyed during the Peninsular War, leaving a space that was eventually opened to the public in 1868. The few remaining buildings of the palace now house museum collections.

Thyssen-Bornemiza Museum The Thyssen Museum, along with the Prado and the Reina Sofía, is one of the main attractions on the Art Walk. With a collection of over 1,000 works of art, the Thyssen-Bornemisza is a key stop on one of the world's most singular cultural and artistic touring routes. Just meters from the Prado and the Reina Sofía, the Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum allows visitors to embark on an exceptional journey through seven centuries of painting or to contemplate any one of the 50 paintings it holds masterpieces that are considered to be universal

The Reina Sofia National Museum The Reina Sofia National Museum and Art Center brings together the new trends in contemporary art and undertakes the task of showing the backbone of Spanish art of our times. The extension of the museum, conducted by renowned French architect Jean Nouvel, has increased the facilities and services provided by the original building and has complemented its activities with two exhibition rooms: a library and an auditorium.

Seville:

Alcázar The Alcazar was built in the 1360s by Moorish craftsmen for Pedro of Castile. It is a UNESCO World Heritage site.
Mezquita Is a Roman Catholic cathedral in Córdoba, Spain. It was originally built to be a warehouse, temple and lighthouse. It later became the second-largest mosque in the world.

Fine Art Museum Built in the 18th century by Juan de Oviedo and set up in the old Convent of la Merced, the Fine Art Museum is arranged around three patios. Here the visitor can admire works by El Greco, Velázquez, Zurbarán and Valdés Leal. Especially interesting is the Murillo collection located in the convent’s church.


Granada:

Alhambra Part fortress (the Alcazaba), part palace, part garden (the Generalife) and part government city (the Medina), this medieval complex overlooking Granada is often considered on par with the 7 wonders of the world. Many visitors come to Granada expressly to see the Alhambra. The Alhambra was a palace, a citadel, fortress, and the home of the Nasrid sultans, high government officials, servants of the court and elite soldiers (from the 13th to the 14th century). Other notable buildings belonging to a different time period are also included, such as the Renaissance style Palace of Charles V, which houses the Alhambra Museum (most of the items are from the site of the monument) and the Fine Art Museum.

The Palacio de Generalife was the summer palace and country estate of the Nasrid sultans of Granada. The palace and gardens were built during the reign of Muhammad III (1302-1309) and redecorated shortly after by Abu I-Walid Isma'il (1313-1324). The complex consists of the Patio de la Acequia (Court of the Water Channel or Water-Garden Courtyard), which has a long pool framed by flowerbeds, fountains, colonnades and pavilions, and the Jardín de la Sultana (Sultana's Garden or Courtyard of the Cypress). The former is thought to best preserve the style of the medieval garden in Al-Andalus. Originally the palace was linked to the Alhambra by a covered walkway across the ravine that now divides them. The Generalife is one of the oldest surviving Moorish gardens.

The Palace of Charles V The Palace of Charles V, in Granada, Spain, is a Renacentist construction, located on the top of the hill of the Assabica, inside the Nasrid fortification of the Alhambra. It was commanded by Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor, in order to establish his residence close to the Alhambra palaces. The Catholic Monarchs had already reformed some rooms after the conquest of the city in 1492, but Charles V intended to construct a stable residence befitting an emperor. The project was commanded to Pedro Machuca, an inscrutable figure whose biography and influences are not already clear. At his time, Spain was inmersed in Plateresque style, still with traces of Gothic origin. Machuca built a palace corresponding to the Mannerism, a still beginning style in Italy. Even if we accept the versions that place Machuca in the atelier of Michelangelo, at the time of the construction of the palace (1527) the Tuscan architect hadn't designed the majority of his architectural works.

Granada Cathedral Granada Cathedral or Cathedral of the Annunciation, is a cathedral designed at the peak of the Spanish Renaissance. In 1529 Diego de Siloé outlined the Renaissance lines of this building upon its Gothic foundations, with a triforium and five naves instead of the usual three. Most unusually, he created a circular capilla mayor rather than a semicircular apse, perhaps inspired by Italian ideas for circular 'perfect buildings' (eg in Alberti's works). Within its structure the cathedral combines other orders of architecture. It took 181 years for the cathedral to be built.

Valencia:

The Fallas Museum Dedicated to the festival of La Fallas, this museum displays figures known as ninots spared since 1934 from the bonfire on St Joseph`s Day. Papier mache sculptures known as fallas, such as effigies satirizing people or current affairs, are specifically made for burning in the bonfires that is set alight on the evening of the 19th of March.

L’Oceanographic L’Oceanographic is part of the great cultural complex Ciudad de las Artes y las Ciencias, and in this magnificent, huge maritime center are several aquariums and other areas focusing on the maritime life of the different climatic zones of the planet. The center is home to several Mediterranean aquariums, a marshland area and lake, aquariums devoted to the temperate zone, a Red Sea auditorium, plus artic and antartic habitats. Sharks inhabit the ocean aquarium, and the dolphinarium with its five pools is the largest in Europe.

Barcelona:

La Sagrada Família La Sagrada Família is truly awe-inspiring. The life's work of Barcelona's favorite son, Antoni Gaudí, the magnificent spires of the unfinished cathedral imprint themselves boldly against the sky with swelling outlines inspired by the holy mountain Montserrat. They are encrusted with a tangle of sculptures that seem to breathe life into the stone. Gaudí died in 1926 before his masterwork was completed, and since then, controversy has continually dogged the building program. Nevertheless, the southwestern (Passion) facade, with four more towers, is almost done, and the nave, begun in 1978, is progressing. Some say the shell should have been left as a monument to the architect, but today's chief architect, Jordi Bonet, argues that the task is a sacred one, as it's a church intended to atone for sin and appeal to God's mercy on Catalunya.

Las Ramblas Five separate streets strung end to end, La Rambla (also called Las Ramblas) is a tree-lined pedestrian boulevard packed with buskers, living statues, mimes and itinerant salespeople selling everything from lottery tickets to jewellery. The noisy bird market on the second block of La Rambla is worth a stop, as is the nearby Palau de la Virreina, a grand 18th-century rococo mansion, with arts and entertainment information and a ticket office. Next door is La Rambla's most colorful market, the Mercat de la Boqueria. Just south of the Boqueria the Mosaic de Miró punctuates the pavement, with one tile signed by the artist. The next section of La Rambla boasts the Gran Teatre del Liceu, the famous 19th-century opera house. La Rambla terminates at the lofty Monument a Colom (Monument to Columbus) and the harbour. You can ascend the monument by lift.

Parc Güell Designed by Antonio Gaudí, Parc Güell is the most famous park in Barcelona, declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO. It has been subject to all types of praise and criticism, including comments such as outrageous modernism, surrealistic island and nightmare expressionist park. First conceived as a private estate, it became a public park in 1922. The main entrance to the park and the stairway leading to the Hundred Columns Room are structures where Gaudí clearly let his imagination run free.