Things to do — Castile and Madrid

Madrid and Castile concentrate one of Europe's densest cultural and gastronomic heritages. The unmissable starting point is Madrid's museum triangle, strung along the Paseo del Prado: the Museo del Prado and its collection of European paintings — Velázquez (Las Meninas), Goya (The Nude Maja, Saturn Devouring His Son, The Third of May 1808), El Greco, Bosch (The Garden of Earthly Delights) — constitute one of the three or four greatest painting collections in the world. The Museo Reina Sofía houses Picasso's Guernica and Spain's most important modern art collection. The Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza completes the ensemble with its old masters and moderns. The three museums together represent several days of serious visiting.

Beyond the museums, Madrid is lived in the streets and in the bars. The La Latina neighbourhood is the temple of traditional Madrid tapas, best explored bar by bar on a Sunday lunchtime over vermut. The Plaza Mayor, the Royal Palace and its gardens, the El Rastro Sunday flea market, the Retiro park with its boating lake compose a two-day walking itinerary.

The Castilian excursions are the natural complement. Toledo (30 min by AVE) is Spain's most heritage-dense medieval city: Gothic cathedral, the El Tránsito and Santa María la Blanca synagogues, the Cristo de la Luz mosque, and El Greco's paintings at the Museo del Greco. Segovia (1 hour by train or bus) is worth visiting as much for its Roman aqueduct as for its medieval alcázar rising like a ship's prow above the confluence of two rivers, and for its celebrated cochinillo asado (roast suckling pig). Salamanca (2h30) glows with its unique golden light and its atmosphere of a thousand-year-old university — its baroque Plaza Mayor is, for many travellers, the finest in Spain.