|
|
<-- Back
Santander Holidays
Santander, port city and capital of Cantabria |
Santander, port city and capital of Cantabria
Tourist information about Santander in Spain. Travel to Santander and let Spain-Holiday.com guide and accommodate you |
The port city of Santander is the capital of the autonomous community of Cantabria situated on the north coast of Spain between Asturias (to the west) and the Basque Country (to the east)..
Santander is a city that lives facing the sea, in the wide bay of the same name.
While the environs have become industrialized, the city center is still the ideal zone to go for a walk along the sport harbours, nice beaches and colourful parks.
Monumental zone of Santander
The monumental zone, where most of the museums and official buildings are, begins at Paseo Pereda and it finishes oppossite the Museum and Library Menéndez Pelayo. This is the commercial zone.
The gardens of Pereda, in memory of a Cantabrian writer, and their avenue is oppossite the harbours and the sea. Shops, stores of naval effects and consignataries of ships remember the time of "indianos".
You must visit Pombo Square, surrounded by aristocratic houses - like the Real Club de Regatas -, and the Porticada Square. The most ancient monument in Santander is the cathedral. It is settled on a Roman layer and it lodges the original church of XIIIC.
Today Santander remains a popular tourist destination. It is renowned for its mild, (though rainy) climate.
Santander has a lot of beaches, but the most emblematic ones are El Sardinero beaches (the First and the Second). It is a sandy ground of almost three kilometers that begins in the Avenue Reina Victoria, next to La Magdalena, and it finishes in front of the famous Chiqui hotel.
Along this way we go along the Camello beach, it is called in this way because tere is a rock modeled by the sea with the shape of this animal. El Sardinero became fashionable in 1847, as the ideal place to take the healthy “baños de olas” (salty baths with the sea waves).
The Italia Square is the neuralgic point of this zone, we can see some houses and buildings of “belle epoque”, emphasizing the Great Casino, inaugurated in 1916. In this zone we can find some of the best hotels in the city.
Santander is a seafaring city and its cooking is based on the sea resources. The restaurants make good use of products of first quality: seafood, fish, and excellent squids, among others.
Here are establishments of all the categories, all along the most typical and turistic zones of the city. In the zone of the harbour we can find some restaurants and taverns and there are a lot of old-style restaurants and tapas bars tin the streets Mola and Hernán Cortés, among others. There are more informal restaurants and tapas bars in the street Peña Herbosa to have the typical “blancos” (white wine) and “rabas” (squids coated in breadcrumbs) on Sundays. In the zone of Vargas,we find the traditional “chiquiteo” (wine and beer), and in San Amaro zone “mejillones picantes” (spicy mussels) and “cañas” (draught beer).
|
|
See a map over Santander
