Caceres Old Town

The walled upper town of Caceres is unusual because almost nothing has been added to it. Inside the circuit, the streets are lined with fifteenth and sixteenth century stone mansions built by families enriched in the Americas, their facades carrying coats of arms and corner towers, and there are no shopfronts, signs or terraces to break the effect. Older Almohad-era towers survive in the walls, including the square Bujaco tower above the Plaza Mayor. Storks nest on almost every high point and clatter their bills across the rooftops. At night, with the lanes lit and largely empty, the place is closer to a stage set than a town.

History

Paintings in the Maltravieso caves show that people lived here in the late Paleolithic, and the Romans founded the city in 25 BC. Thirty towers from the Islamic period still stand, the Torre del Bujaco the best known, and the old town keeps its walls along with remains of the Roman and Moorish eras and of its Jewish quarter; in 1986 UNESCO declared it a World Heritage City for its blend of Roman, Moorish, Northern Gothic and Italian Renaissance architecture (Wikipedia, Old Town of Cáceres).

Highlights

• The Plaza Mayor and Bujaco tower - the town's front door, with steps up into the walls.
• The mansion facades - carved coats of arms and corner turrets along silent lanes.
• The stork nests - large nests on towers and church roofs, occupied much of the year.
• The night walk - lit stone streets almost empty after dinner.

When to go

Spring and autumn. Extremadura routinely passes forty degrees in July and August, and the stone holds the heat well into the night. The old town is at its best at dusk and after dark once the day visitors have gone. Museums and towers close for a long midday break, so plan the walking for those hours.

Before you go

Most of the mansions are private or institutional, so this is a looking-at-facades experience rather than an interiors one. The old town empties in the evening and dining is concentrated around the Plaza Mayor. Rail links to Extremadura are slow and limited. In high summer the heat makes daytime walking genuinely unpleasant.

Nearby

Trujillo's castle and square, the Monfrague bird reserve and the monastery town of Guadalupe.

Key facts