Best Castle

Hi Beatrice,

Peñafiel is now the Provincial Wine Museum. So if you want to visit a castle and do some wine tasting you can kill two birds with one stone. Otherwise I would put it on the bottom of the list.

Alcázar, in Segovia? It is a Unesco Heritage Site, and very interesting. I visited years ago and we had our dog with us, a miniture schnauzer. The lady at the ticket counter told us we could take him in if we carried him. So we did. It was a great visit.

Strictly for geography by distance I’d drop Ponferrada. The Alcázar in Segovia is splendid and should be towards to top of the list. It is an 1800s reconstruction so not as old as it looks. Believe it had a couple fires. Both Mota and Coca are visually amazing and can be seen in a day. There isn’t much on the inside that one can visit, so both are best seen from the outside. Back in 2007, if I remember correctly, one had municipal offices and one a forestry school or similar. We also enjoyed Peñafiel before it was a wine museum. If you wanted to drive by other castles in that area there are castles in Torrelbaton, Arévalo, Cuellar, Portillo, and Valencia de Don Juan.

Great tips, thanks!! I did hear that Segovia was an above average castle experience. I'll try to make it even though it's a bit out of the way from Salamanca going towards Burgos.

If going from Salamanca to Burgos then Coca and Mota are closest to your route. If time, you could drive by Cuellar and Portillo. Once arriving at Valladolid you’ll get onto the A-11 that will take you by Peñafiel. You can see it from the road even if you decided not to stop. It’s long and very narrow which is rather unique for a castle. You’d then turn north towards Burgos at Aranda de Duero. When you pass through Olmedo (it’s between Coca and Mota) look for the stork nests while driving through. Also, depending on how to get to Mota castle, if you pass through Tordesillas, the Real Monasterio de Santa Clara was worth stopping at, but there’s little else in that town. If you skipped the A-11 and went up towards Palencia then you could see Ampudia castle or the nearby Montealegre de Campos Castle. I haven’t been to either of those. Since you’ll be driving, once off the main roads, the roads will mostly be 2-lanes with no shoulder, in good condition, and with little other traffic. Beware of speed cameras entering and leaving small towns.

Segovia is the only castle I've been to in Spain, but when you consider that you also get to see an amazing Roman aqueduct, it would get my vote.

so the whole road trip is actually Sintra (home) - Toulouse. In one shot it would be 12 hours so I decided to break it up and see some castles (I only need to be there 4 days later)... the more I look into it, the more I discover in an area that had never caught my attention until now. Thanks again!

Depending on your route from Sintra to Toulouse, there are several other historical points of interest that you could stop at:

Monasterio de San Yuste - located closer to the border with Portugal, this is the idyllical monastery (still active) that Holy Roman Emperor Carlos V retired to after he was done being the most powerful man in the world at the time. One can still visit the Emperor's apartments.

Olite Royal Palace - a fortified medieval town with winding narrow streets and impressive old walls. Don't miss the Royal Palace of Olite, the seat of the Kings of Navarre, actually incorporated into the old town's fortifications. For me, it's one of the more impressive medieval castles in Europe.

Castillo de Loarre - one of the oldest castles still standing castles in Spain, it was featured in Ridley Scott's epic film Kingdom of Heaven. The location of Loarre Castle is very picturesque as it sits high on a cliff overlooking the southern foothills of the Pyrenees.

@Carlos those places look amazing!

2 is fantastic;

3 requires a detour from my original road itinerary on A-64 but possible.. E-7 to Pau would be the way to go afterwards then?
And it seems most Spanish highways are no longer toll roads, that's a plus :-)

Yes, the E-7 would be the way to go. From Loarre, take the A-1206 to Ayerbe, then get onto the A-132. When the road splits, take the A-1205 towards Jaca that is where you’d get onto the E-7. Note that the A-1205 and 1206 are very rural roads. They are narrower than the A-132, no shoulder, and no centerline marking. There won’t be much traffic. It seems Loarre castle only has guided tours.

@jaimeelsabio thanks!! packing my bags in a few days if you remember anything else :-)
weather's been gorgeous

I sent you a private message containing a number of places you could visit if you needed a driving break. You can look them up and save them on Google map then bring maps up via the Internet or downloaded for offline use to see if anything is in the area where you are. Have a nice trip.

For lodging along you route, we enjoy staying at Spain’s Paradors. Along what I think part of your route might be there are Paradors in Salamanca, Tordesillas, Lerma, Santo Domingo de la Calzada, Olite, and SOS Del Rey Católico.