Spain

From Imakoopedia

Spain is a beautiful and diverse Western European country, sharing the Iberian Peninsula with Portugal at the western end of the Mediterranean Sea. Once the centre of a global empire with colonies in Central and South America, and the Phillipines, contemporary Spain has overcome civil war and fascism in the 20th century to stand proud and centered in itself. With great beaches, fun nightlife, many cultural regions and historic cities, Spain makes a great destination for any kind of trip.

Table of contents

1 Regions 2 Cities 3 Towns 4 Other Destinations 5 Understand 6 Get in 6.1 By plane 6.2 By train 6.3 By car 6.4 By bus 6.5 By boat 7 Get around 8 Talk 9 Buy 10 Eat 10.1 Bars and fast food 10.2 Restaurants 10.3 Service 10.4 Tipping 10.5 Special offers 10.6 Lunch and dinner times 10.7 Touristy places 10.8 Spanish dishes 11 Drink 11.1 Bars 11.2 Beer 11.3 Cava 11.4 Sangria 11.5 Sherry (Fino) 11.6 Wine 12 Sleep 12.1 Paradores 13 Learn 14 Work 15 Stay safe 16 Stay healthy 17 Respect 18 Contact 19 External links

Regions

• Andalucia
• Aragón
• Asturias
• Balearic Islands (Catalan: Les Illes Balears,Spanish: Las Islas Baleares)
• Basque Country (Spanish: El País Vasco, Basque: Euskadi or Euskal Herria)
• Canary Islands (Spanish: Las Islas Canarías)
• Cantabria
• Castilla La Mancha
• Castile-Leon (Spanish: Castilla y León)
• Catalonia (Catalan: Catalunya, Spanish: Cataluña)
• Extremadura
• Galicia
• Madrid -- capital of Spain, Prado, Escorial
• Murcia
• Navarra (Basque: Nafarroa)
• Valencia (Spanish: Comunidad Valenciana)

Cities

Spain has hundreds of interesting cities. These are some of the major travel destinations among them.

• Barcelona Buzzing city, Capital of the Catalans
• Bilbao Home of the Guggenheim Museum
• Córdoba
• Cuenca
• Granada Stunning city in the south, surrounded by snow capped mountains of the Sierra Nevada, home of the Alhambra
• Madrid Capital of Spain
• Málaga close to Marbella, but not very posh
• Marbella posh people go there and the ones who thing they are go as well
• Merida well preserved roman ruins
• Murcia
• Pamplona famous for the bull chasing
• Salamanca
• San Sebastián Among the poshest cities in Spain
• Segovia See the roman aqueduct in the middle of town
• Seville beautiful, beautiful see the Giralda
• Toledo City of gold plates
• Valencia Paella was invented here
• Virgo
• Saragossa

Towns

• Vigo

Other Destinations

• La Rioja - Rioja wine and fossilized dinosaur tracks
• Jerez de la Frontera - the home of Sherry wine
• Andorra - one of the smallest countries in the world, a principality nestling in the Pyrenees
• Gibraltar - apes, pounds sterling and cause of long dispute between Spain and the UK

Understand

Get in

Spain is a member of the European Union and the Schengen Agreement. European visa policy will be covered in the article about the EU. No visa is required for citizens of other EU member states, and those of some selected nations with whom the European Union special treaties.

As of May 2004 only the citizens of the following countries do not need a visa for entry into Spain. Note that citizens of these countries (except EU nationals) must not stay longer than three months in half a year and must not work in Spain: Andorra, Argentina, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Bermuda, Bolivia, Brazil, Brunei, Bulgaria, Canada, Chile, Costa Rica, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, El Salvador, Estonia, Finland, France, Greece, Guatemala, Honduras, Hong Kong, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Japan, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Macao, Malaysia, Malta, Mexico, Monaco, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Netherlands, Norway, Panama, Paraguay, Poland, Portugal, Romania, San Marino, Sweden, Switzerland, Singapore, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, South Korea, United Kingdom, United States, Uruguay, Vatican City and Venezuela.

Also, there are no border controls between Spain and other Schengen Agreement nations, making travel less complicated.

There are a number of ways to get into Spain. From neighboring European countries, a drive with the car or a train ride are feasible; visitors from further away will probably be using air travel.

By plane

The most important airports are Palma de Mallorca, Madrid, Malaga, Barcelona, Jere de la Frontera, Seville, Bilbao and Alic ante.

By train

By car

By bus

By boat

Get around

Talk

The primary language used in Spain is "Castellano " Castilian Spanish. There are, however, a number of regional languages and dialects. Galician (Spanish: Gallego), which is similar to Portuguese, is spoken in Galicia and the west of Asturias. Basque (Basque: Esra), a language with no known linguistic relatives, is spoken in the Basque Country. Catalan (Catalan: Catalan), which is slightly more similar to French than to Spanish, is spoken in Catalonia. Dialects of Catalan are spoken in the Valencia region and the Balearic Islands. (NB: there are arguments among st linguists and politicians as to whether these are dialects of Catalan or languages in their own right).

Surprisingly, Spanish has developed very few local dialects and once you are able to understand Spanish you will be able to do so all over Spain. French and English are commonly learned in school. French is often well spoken and English is spoken to a slightly lesser extent. See also: Spanish phrasebook

Buy

Spain is part of the European Union and the Eurozone; as such it replaced Spanish pesetas with the Euro (symbol: €) in the year 2002. Since it has been only a few years since the introduction of Euro cash, a few people will still use the old national currency names. For example, it is entirely possible that a Spaniard would still refer to peseta. They mean Euros and Cents, so just mentally substitute the two. Do not expect anybody to accept other types of currency, or to be willing to exchange currency. An exception are shops and restaurants at airports and also - more rarely. These will generally accept at least US Dollars at a slightly worse exchange rate. If you wish to exchange money, you can do so at any bank, where you can also cash in your traveller's cheques. Currency exchanges, once a common sight, have all but disappeared since the introduction of the Euro. Again, international airports are an exception to this rule. Credit cards are well accepted. Most ATMs will allow you to withdraw money with your credit card, but you'll need to know your card's PIN for that.

Eat

Spanish are very passionate about their food and wine and Spanish cuisine is home of the world famous Paella. Spanish food can be described as quiet light with a lot of vegetable and huge variety of meat and fish. The Spanish cuisine does not use many spices relies only on the use of high quality ingredients to give a good taste.

Bars and fast food

The entry level to Spanish food is found in bars. Often you find a variety of different tapas and bars often specialize on some tapas. A Spanish custom is to have one tapa and one small drink and then go to the next bar and do the same. Tourists are easily spotted when they load their plates full of tapas. Fast food has not yet established a strong grip on the Spaniards and you will find McDonalds and BB only in bigger towns in the usual places. Pizza is increasingly popular and you will find some outlets in bigger towns as well.

Restaurants

Restaurants deliver a wide range of food and in coastal areas seafood deserves some attention, especially in the north Atlantic coast. Spanish are very concerned about the freshness of seafood and it can happen that you place a order and the waiter tells you that he can not serve this dish, because they did not receive this particular seafood freshly on the day. It is very unlikely to find dishes that had been prepared from frozen fish in real Spanish restaurant. Obviously so much freshness has its toll and seafood is quite pricy. Meat products are usually of very good quality, because Spain had maintained a quiet high percentage of free range animal. A speciality is "jamon iberico" from free range pigs.

Service

Despite the good food the service in Spain is often lousy and waiters seem to be not very skilled in their profession or least they are not bothered about anything. Double that for touristy place, when you are a foreigner, and / or you are not fluent in Spanish.

Tipping

A little tip is common and you are free to increase that if you are very pleased, but obviously you don’t have to tip a lousy waiter.

Special offers

Many restaurants offer a lunch time menu for a fixed price and this often works out as a bargain. It is quiet common that water and wines are included in the fixed deal.

Lunch and dinner times

Spaniards have a slightly different timetable than most people are used to: the main lunch time starts at around 2 pm and is then followed by the traditional siesta time. Dinnertime starts at around 10 pm so don’t surprised that a restaurant looks completely deserted at 8 pm.

Touristy places

Typical Spanish food can be found all over the country, however top tourist destinations such as Costa Brava and Costa del Sol have turned all existing traditions upside down. Meaning that drinks are generally more expensive (about double) and it is extremely difficult to find proper Spanish food. However you will get Schnitzel, original English breakfast, Pizza, Doner, frozen fish and all the good things that modern society has invented to supersize you.

Spanish dishes

Typical dishes are:

• “Calamares en su tinta”:

• “Chorizo”: Spains most popular sausage is made from pig meat, ham, salt, garlic and pepper and is produced in multitude of varieties, in different sizes, shapes, short and long, spicy, in all different shades of red, soft, air dried and hard or smoked.

• “Fabada asturiana”: bean stew from Asturias

• “Gambas pil pil”: little prawn with garlic and chilli

• “Gazpacho Andaluz”: cold vegetable soup

• “ Merluza a la Vizcaina” : Spanish are not very of sauces, one of the few exception is merluza a la Vasca in this case the fish is prepared with white asparagus and green peas.

• “Morcilla” - sausages made from pig blood flavoured with anise, it comes as a fresh, smoked or air dried variety.

• “Aceitunas, Olivas”: often served for nibbling, is the fruit of olive tree.

• “Paella”: famous rice dish originally from Valencia and now eaten all over Spain.

• “Pimientos rellenos”: filled peppers stuffed with minced meat or seafood, whatever version you on a Menu the peppers in Spain taste different from all other peppers in Europe.

• “Potaje de espinacas y garbanzos”: chick pea stew with spinach

• “Tortilla de patatas”: probably the most popular dish in Spain. You can easily assess how good a restaurant is by having a small peace of “Tortilla de patatas”.

• “Rabo de toro”: Oxtail is very famous dish in Spain, obviously there is loads of them available after a bull fight.

Drink

Bars

Probably one of the best places to meet people in Spain is in bars. Everyone visits them and they are always busy and sometimes bursting with people. There are no age restriction imposed to enter these premises. They are mainly to have drink or a small tapa. Usually Spaniards can control their drink better than their northern European fellows and drunk people are rarely seen here or on the streets.

Beer

The Spanish beer is not too bad at all and well worth a try. To get a beer you order “una cerveza” and you get a tiny glass of beer, if you want to have something in the region of a half pint you order “una cania” bigger sizes are not commonly used in Spain, but you can try to order “una hara” or “canion”.

Cava

Cava is the latest name for Spanish bubbly water and was invented after along lasting dispute with the French about the right name for the bubbly water. The Spanish called it for a long time champan, but the French argued that champagne can made only from grapes grown in the Champagne region in France. Nevertheless, Cave is a quiet successful bubbly water and 99% of the production comes from the area around Barcelona.

Sangria

Sangria is drink made of wine and fruits and usually is made from simple wines. You will find sangria mainly in touristy places prepared for tourists. Spanish prepare sangria for fiestas only and not every day as seen in Mallorca.

Sherry (Fino)

The wines around Jerez are very high in alcohol and they produce the famous sherry. If you would like to have one in a bar you have to order a fino.

Wine

Spain is a country with great wine-making traditions: 22% of Europe's wine growing area is located in Spain, however the production is about half of what the French produce. The most famous wines come from Rioja and from Ribera del Duero. The later ones are becoming more and more popular and are slightly more expensive than Rioja wines. White, rose and red wines are produced, but the red wines are certainly the most important ones. Spanish wines are produced with time and they have been in a oak barrel for at least one year (Crianza) and then another two years in a bottle, Reservas are first released after five years and Gran Reservas leave the wine estate after 10 years. Spain has seen a tremendous rise in wine prices over the last decade and Spanish wines are not any more such a bargain as they were one decade before. However you will still find 5, 10 and 20 year old wines for affordable prices.

To order a red wine in a bar you have to ask for a "un tinto por favor", white wine "un blanco por favor" and last not least rose "un rosado por favor"

Sleep

Paradores

A chain of hotels that was funded 1910 by the Spanish King Alfonso XIII has a lot on offer and you probably don't find anything similar it in the world. The special thing about Paradores is usually their location and their history. Seeing the worst ever examples of a fast growth in the coastal regions such the Costa del sol and elsewhere are Paradores the absolute opposite. The best examples of how the characteristics of hospitality were harmoniously integrated with the restoration of castles, palaces and convents, rescuing from ruin and abandonment monuments representative of Spain's historical and cultural heritage.

For example the Parador in Santiago de Compostella is located in a building from the year 1499 which was a royal hospital at this time next to the cathedral which is the major attraction of Santiago de Compostella. Rooms are decorated in stile from the past time, but nevertheless have modern facilities. Other examples of great destinations are Arcos de la Frontera, Ronda, Santillana del Mar (Altamira cave) as well as more than 100 other destination all over Spain.

Paradores will serve breakfast and have often very good local cuisine.

Prices are good value for money given the fact that you are often in scenic places, have the best possible view.

http://www.parador.es/english/index.jsp (http://www.parador.es/english/index.jsp)

Learn

Work

Stay safe

Stay healthy

Respect

Contact

External links

• Tour España (http://www.spain.info/TourSpain/Home?Language=en) - official website of the Spanish Tourism authority
• Spain (http://www.in-spain.info/) - Useful travel and tourism guide to Spain
• Map of Spain (http://www.map-of-spain.co.uk/) - Maps of Spain and its regions and cities