Experience the best of Valladolid

Valladolid stands on the high plateau of northern Spain, where the Pisuerga and Esgueva rivers meet, and served as the royal capital between 1601 and 1606. Its rebuilt Plaza Mayor is a broad arcaded square, and the nearby streets hold the university, founded in the thirteenth century, and the cathedral, an unfinished Renaissance building. Christopher Columbus died in the city in 1506.

The National Museum of Sculpture, in the Gothic College of San Gregorio, shows polychrome wooden sculptures carved for the church processions of Holy Week. The house where Cervantes lived when Don Quixote was first published is now a museum, and the park of Campo Grande has peacocks among its trees. Tordesillas, where Spain and Portugal divided the world in 1494, and the Rueda wine country lie to the south-west.

Small plates of food on bread, called pinchos, are the city's bar fare, and roast suckling lamb, lechazo, is the great meal of Castile, with wines from Ribera del Duero and Rueda. The climate is continental, with hot, dry summers and cold winters, sometimes foggy. Holy Week, with its solemn processions, is the moment to see the city's sculptures in the streets.