Salamanca - The Golden City

Salamanca is a truly beautiful city, the buildings constructed of sandstone, which, when the sun sets makes the buildings look a beautiful gold colour, which has led to the nickname La Dorada (The Golden City). It is a student city, so similar in many ways to Granada in the south of Spain, however there is a difference. Salamanca university is one of the oldest universities in Europe and oldest in Spain, founded in 1218, and was even the first in Western Europe to be given its status by Pope Alexander IV.

Casa das Conchas - famous house in Salamanca decorated with 530 shells

The university buildings are built out of the same sandstone as all the other buildings in the historic centre of Salamanca, which is in fact a UNESCO world heritage site. The university attracts thousands of students from around the globe giving the city a very diverse feel to it. It is also the leading Spanish language teaching university in Spain, making it a popular spot for people to go to learn Spanish.

The main entrance to the University

The university is divided up into lots of separate buildings spread throughout the historic centre, called colleges, very similar to the Oxford and Cambridge universities in England. Having the same sense of grandeur and old traditions. We visited many of these buildings and even went inside one or two to see some beautiful courtyards and Hogwarts like interiors.

Plaza Mayor - the main square in Salamanca

One key highlight was the Sky of Salamanca, which is through a door off of the Escuelas Menores courtyard. It is in a very dimly lit room, and as you approach you look up and see a domed ceiling painted pale blue and covered in gold stars. It is part of a 15th-century painting that covered part of the ceiling of the university library and is apparently a view of the astrological heavens from that period.

The Escuelas Menores courtyard

There are many religious buildings scattered all over Salamanca's historic centre, but the ones that stand out the most and is different to most other Spanish cities is its Cathedral, or should I say two cathedrals. One built in the 12th century in Romanesque style and the newer one, right next door started in the 16th century and completed in the 18th century, built in Gothic style. The two cathedrals are actually joined and where the two cathedrals join it is called Patio Chico, a really lovely spot.

The new Cathedral

Of the other religious buildings, I thought I would mention one that looked really nice and was quite impressive, which was the Convento de San Esteban, which is a Dominican Monastery built between 1524 and 1610. It is situated in Plaza del Concilio not far from the cathedrals.

Carmen with Concento de San Esteban in the background

In contrast with the sandstone buildings of Salamanca there is a Roman bridge built in the 1st century BC across the river, which supposedly used to join a Roman road that led all the way south to Merida. It is still used today and is in very good condition.

Carmen on the Roman bridge

Although Salamanca is inundated with religious buildings and has a very positive history, there is also a darker side to Salamanca, a side we did not expect. There is a place within Salamanca's historic centre known as, El Cueva del Diablo, otherwise known in English as The Cave of the Devil. The name is actually a bit misleading as it is not in fact a cave but instead the crypt of the ruined 12th century church San Ciprian. According to the legends it was here that the Devil taught spells and black magic to 7 students for 7 years. There are several different accounts of what form the Devil took whilst teaching these students, the main ones being the caretaker of the ruined church, a hand on a chair, and a male goat. The cost for the students to learn from the Devil was one human soul. After they had studied for 7 years, they then had to draw lots to see which of them would give up his soul and spend the rest of his life in service to the Devil in the crypt.  It was a fascinating story and you could see why it had this reputation as parts of it were really very creepy.

The entrance to El Cueva del Diablo

On a more positive note Salamanca also has a very nice traditional food called a Hornazo, which is a essentially a meat pie filled with spicy chorizo sausage, pork loin and hard boiled egg. It may not be the healthiest of foods, but it is certainly a very tasty one! We would happily have had more of these if we were staying longer.

Delicious Hornazo

We were also lucky enough to meet a couple of people in the hostel we stayed in Salamanca, one a guy traveling around Spain and Portugal on a motorbike from the North coast of Wales and another a girl from Sydney, Australia who gave us some good advice about places to visit in Portugal. It was unfortunate we couldn't have stayed longer to chat with them more, but we had to move onwards. Next stops Avila and Segovia, ancient cities not far from Madrid.