Spain: Madrid and Old Castile, from Segovia to Toledo

1. Day 1: Arrive in Madrid

   Madrid-Barajas Airport (MAD) to your hotel in central Madrid

   • Drive about 30 min
   • Welcome dinner
   • Stay in Madrid
   Day 1 details

   Fly into Madrid-Barajas Airport (MAD), about 15 km from the centre, where a driver meets you in the arrivals hall and takes you to your hotel near the old city. Plan to land by about 3 pm so you have time to rest. At about 6 pm your See Sight Tours guide meets the group for a short briefing on the week: which days start early, where the free afternoons fall and how the drives are broken up. Then we walk out together into the evening streets of the Madrid de los Austrias, the oldest part of the city: Puerta del Sol, the arcaded Plaza Mayor finished in the 17th century, and the narrow lanes towards the Royal Palace as the lights come on. Madrid eats late, so the welcome dinner starts around 8:30 pm at a local restaurant, with shared plates and time to meet the people you will travel with. If you land early, the Retiro park is an easy first afternoon.

   Included

   • Pick-up at Madrid-Barajas Airport (MAD)
   • Welcome briefing with your guide
   • Evening walk: Puerta del Sol, Plaza Mayor and the Madrid de los Austrias
   • Welcome dinner

   Free time: Free until the 6 pm briefing

   

2. Day 2: The Prado, then tapas in La Latina

   Madrid on foot: the Prado, the Barrio de las Letras and La Latina

   • Breakfast and dinner
   • Stay in Madrid
   Day 2 details

   We walk to the Prado for its 10 am opening, ahead of the tour coaches, and spend two hours inside with a licensed local guide. The visit stays with the Spanish painters you will meet again on this trip: Velázquez's Las Meninas, El Greco's elongated saints (good preparation for Toledo), and Goya, from the bright court portraits to the Black Paintings he made on the walls of his own house. After the guided visit you can stay on in the galleries as long as you like. Lunch is your own choice in the Barrio de las Letras, the old writers' quarter a few streets away, and the afternoon is free: the Retiro park, the Royal Palace or a siesta. In the evening we meet again for a tapas walk through La Latina and the Cava Baja, three or four bars, a few plates at each, standing at the counter as Madrid does. The tapas evening is your dinner tonight.

   Included

   • The Prado at opening with a licensed local guide, about 2 hours
   • Evening tapas walk in La Latina and the Cava Baja, three or four bars, as dinner

   Optional experiences

   • Royal Palace interior (entry on your own)
   • Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum (entry on your own)

   Free time: Afternoon free

   Activity: About 3 to 4 hours on your feet in the museum and on the tapas walk, all on level city streets.

   

3. Day 3: El Escorial and the Reina Sofía

   Madrid to San Lorenzo de El Escorial and back, then the Reina Sofía

   • Drive about 1.5 h
   • Breakfast and lunch
   • Stay in Madrid
   Day 3 details

   A short drive takes us about 50 km north-west into the foothills of the Sierra de Guadarrama to San Lorenzo de El Escorial. Philip II built the monastery and palace in the late 16th century as a royal residence, a monastery and a burial place for the kings of Spain, and it has been on the UNESCO list since 1984. We go in at its 10 am opening with a local guide: the library with its painted vaults, the basilica, the plain apartments where Philip II lived and died, and the Pantheon of the Kings below the altar. Lunch is a sit-down meal in the town, then we drive back to Madrid. In the late afternoon we visit the Reina Sofía, Madrid's modern art museum, for about an hour and a half with the guide, built around Picasso's Guernica and the rooms of Dalí and Miró around it. The evening is yours.

   Included

   • El Escorial monastery and palace with a local guide
   • Sit-down lunch in San Lorenzo de El Escorial
   • The Reina Sofía museum with your guide, about 1.5 hours, including Picasso's Guernica

   Easier option: Skip the Reina Sofía and take the afternoon at the hotel or in the Retiro park.

   Free time: Evening free

   Activity: The monastery visit is about 2 hours on foot, with stairs down to the Pantheon of the Kings.

   

4. Day 4: Segovia: the aqueduct and the Alcázar

   Madrid to Segovia across the Sierra de Guadarrama

   • Drive about 1.5 h
   • Breakfast and lunch
   • Stay in Segovia
   Day 4 details

   We leave Madrid at about 8:30 am and drive about 90 km, an hour and a quarter, through the tunnels under the Sierra de Guadarrama to Segovia, where the old town and its aqueduct have been on the UNESCO list since 1985. The first stop is the Roman aqueduct itself, about 28 m high at its tallest in the Plaza del Azoguejo, built of granite blocks without mortar around the end of the 1st century AD. From there we walk up through the old town with a local guide to the Cathedral, one of the last Gothic cathedrals built in Spain, and along the ridge to the Alcázar, the castle on the rock above the meeting of two rivers. Climb the Tower of Juan II for the view of the plains. Lunch is a long sit-down meal of Segovia's roast suckling pig, cochinillo, or another local dish if you prefer. The late afternoon and evening are free; the walk round the town walls at sunset is lovely.

   Included

   • Segovia's Roman aqueduct with a local guide
   • Segovia Cathedral
   • The Alcázar of Segovia, with the Tower of Juan II
   • Sit-down lunch in Segovia

   Easier option: Skip the tower climb and take the Alcázar's palace rooms at your own pace.

   More active option: Climb the 152 steps of the Tower of Juan II at the Alcázar for the view over the old town and the plains.

   Free time: Late afternoon and evening free

   Activity: Segovia sits at about 1,000 m, so evenings are cool even in spring and autumn. About 3 hours on foot, with some steep lanes.

   

5. Day 5: Ávila's walls, then Salamanca

   Segovia to Ávila, then on to Salamanca

   • Drive about 2.5 h
   • Breakfast and lunch
   • Stay in Salamanca
   Day 5 details

   An hour's drive west, about 67 km, brings us to Ávila, the highest provincial capital in Spain at about 1,130 m, ringed by medieval walls with about 87 towers and nine gates that are among the most complete in Europe. We walk a section along the top of the walls with a local guide, then visit the Cathedral, whose apse is built into the walls like a fortress tower, and the streets where Saint Teresa of Ávila was born. Lunch is a sit-down meal in Ávila, perhaps the local beef, with the yolk sweets called yemas de Santa Teresa after. In the afternoon we drive about 100 km, an hour and a quarter, to Salamanca, the honey-coloured university city whose old town is on the UNESCO list since 1988. We arrive with time to rest, then walk to the Plaza Mayor, built in the 18th century and at its best in the evening, when the stone glows under the lights. Dinner is your own choice.

   Included

   • Walk on Ávila's medieval walls with a local guide
   • Ávila Cathedral
   • Sit-down lunch in Ávila
   • Evening walk to Salamanca's Plaza Mayor

   Easier option: Stay at ground level and walk the outside of the walls to the Puerta del Alcázar instead of the climb to the top.

   Free time: Evening free in Salamanca

   Activity: The walls have steep steps at the access points and uneven paving on top. Ávila is the highest point of the trip, about 1,130 m. From late October to late March the walls close on Mondays; departures in those months are set so this day never falls on a Monday.

   

6. Day 6: Salamanca's university, then a 3-hour drive to Toledo

   Salamanca to Toledo

   • Drive about 3.5 h
   • Breakfast, lunch and dinner
   • Stay in Toledo
   Day 6 details

   Salamanca's university, founded in 1218, is one of the oldest in Europe. We meet at about 9:30 am to walk to its Plateresque facade, carved in stone like lace, where students still search for the small frog on a skull for luck, then visit the Old and New Cathedrals, which stand side by side, and climb the Ieronimus towers for the view across the rooftops. After an early sit-down lunch we drive about 245 km to Toledo, about three hours, with a coffee stop in the countryside halfway. This is the longest drive of the trip and stays inside the four-hour cap. We check into a hotel inside the old town, so the evening is spent on foot. At sunset we drive across the Tagus to the Mirador del Valle, where the whole city stands on its rock above the river bend, then walk back into the lanes for a farewell dinner together.

   Included

   • Salamanca University facade with your guide
   • The Old and New Cathedrals of Salamanca and the Ieronimus towers
   • Sit-down lunch in Salamanca
   • Sunset at the Mirador del Valle, Toledo
   • Farewell dinner in Toledo's old town

   Easier option: Skip the climb up the Ieronimus towers and wait in the Patio Chico garden between the cathedrals.

   Activity: The longest drive, about 3 hours plus a coffee stop, so we start with a morning on foot and lunch before we go.

   

7. Day 7: Toledo's old town, then Madrid

   Toledo to Madrid-Barajas Airport (MAD) or central Madrid

   • Drive about 1.5 h
   • Breakfast
   Day 7 details

   Toledo, on the UNESCO list since 1986, is at its quietest before the day-trippers arrive from Madrid, and you are already inside the walls. We walk the empty lanes early with a local guide, then go into the Primate Cathedral at its 10 am opening: Gothic outside, and inside a crowd of chapels, the gilded altarpiece and the Transparente, a Baroque burst of light cut through the vault. From there it is a few minutes to the church of Santo Tomé, where El Greco's Burial of the Count of Orgaz still hangs in the chapel it was painted for, and on to the Synagogue of Santa María la Blanca with its rows of white horseshoe arches. At about 1 pm we drive about 95 km, an hour and a quarter, to Madrid-Barajas Airport, or to central Madrid if you are staying on. Book a flight that leaves after about 5 pm.

   Included

   • Toledo's old town with a local guide
   • Toledo Cathedral
   • Santo Tomé and El Greco's Burial of the Count of Orgaz
   • The Synagogue of Santa María la Blanca
   • Drop-off at Madrid-Barajas Airport (MAD) or central Madrid

   Easier option: For a flight before about 4 pm we leave Toledo after the Cathedral.

   Activity: Book a flight leaving Madrid after about 5 pm to see all of Toledo. About 2.5 hours on foot on steep, cobbled lanes.

   

Wildlife and weather: Spring and autumn bring mild days and cool evenings on the Castilian plateau. July and August are hot in Madrid and Toledo, so we walk in the mornings and evenings; in winter Segovia and Ávila are cold and can see snow.

• Madrid3 nights
• Segovia1 night
• Salamanca1 night
• Toledo1 night