Just a few minutes away from the Mezquita, to the east along calle Luis de la Cerda/Lineros, is the Plaza del Potro (Square of the Colt), a long, rectangular square which slopes down towards the nearby Guadalquivir river to the south. It is named after the 16th-century fountain in the plaza (1577).
This highest and most important of the city's old watchtowers is a fine place to get your bearings and affords a dramatic panorama of the city. Back in the 18th century, Cadiz had no less than 160 towers to watch over its harbours.
The archaeology museum on the ground floor. Some excellent glassware and jewelry are highlights and there is a good collection of amphorae as you'd expect from an historic port.
The grandiose Cadiz cathedral took over 130 years to build. Started in Baroque style and completed in Neo-clasical style, the dome and the towers are much smaller than originally intended.
This theatre is located within a wonderful neo-Mudejar red brick building and has an impressive interior as well. There is an active programme throughout the year, check the tourist office for a schedule of events.
Like so many towns in Andalucía the approach to El Puerto de Santa María along the main road is lined with garages, industrial plants and run down buildings. Keep going and cross the River Guadalete on the NIV (if coming from south) and turn into Calle Ribiera de los Mariscos and park in one of the car parks signposted.
North of Cadiz is the so-called sherry triangle, its corners marked by three towns sprinkled with producers of sherry and brandy whose bodegas (wine cellars) can be visited. Jerez de la Frontera is renowned for its sherry, as well as having a longstanding equestrian tradition and a claim to being the home of flamenco.
The Duquesa de Alba was one of Spain's most famous aristocrats, and one of Seville best-loved personalities, until her death in 2014. With palaces and castles all over Spain, Cayetana was happiest in her home in the historic city centre, Casa de las Dueñas.
Cordoban painter Julio Romero de Torres is much loved in his home town, and around Spain - his works, which you`ll see on posters everywhere, have adorned postage stamps and bank notes, and inspired songs and films.
In 1519 Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan set sail from Seville with a fleet of five naos (carracks or carvel-built wooden sailing ships) to find the Molluca spice islands, in modern-day Indonesia. Three years later, only one of his naos returned, the Nao Victoria, captained by Juan Sebastian Elcano – Magellan had been killed in a conflict in the Philippines.
Jerez de la Frontera is one of Andalucia’s most delightful small cities. Rich in culture and gastronomy, the Cadiz town is famous for sherry, horses and flamenco.
One of the curious things about Jerez, is that alongside the wealthy (though less so lately) equestrian sherry barons, there is a vibrant flamenco tradition - two very different aspects of Andalucian culture.
Spain´s most famous 20th-century literary figure, Federico Garcia Lorca, was murdered by Fascists, probably for his political leanings and sexual orientation, in Granada, in 1936 - just before the outbreak of the Civil War. Although renowned throughout the world, Lorca´s name was banned under Franco and he was apparently forgotten.
