Tarragona
UNESCO World Heritage Site (Archaeological Ensemble Of Tarraco, Inscribed 2000), Capital Of The Roman Province Of Hispania Citerior, With An Amphitheatre Above The Sea, A Circus, Provincial Forum, Walls And Aqueduct · Tarragona, Catalonia
Roman Tarraco was the capital of the largest province in Hispania and the base from which Rome took the peninsula, and what survives is unusually complete and unusually well placed: an amphitheatre cut into the slope directly above the sea, so the arena has the Mediterranean behind it, which is the photograph and is genuinely startling the first time. Around it are a circus tunnelled under the modern streets, a provincial forum, a stretch of pre-Roman and Roman wall you can walk, and an aqueduct in woodland outside town. A medieval cathedral sits on the temple platform at the top of the hill. The whole ensemble is UNESCO-listed and it is an hour from Barcelona on a cheap train, which makes the visitor numbers hard to explain. The old town above the ruins is small and pleasant, the beach below is a working city beach, and the human towers the region builds are a serious local obsession rather than a folk display for visitors.
Parc de l Amfiteatre Roma, Tarragona, Catalonia, 43003, Spain
NO OPENING TIME HERE WAS CHECKED. The structure: the Roman sites on the combined municipal card keep daytime hours with SEPARATE SUMMER AND WINTER SCHEDULES, a shorter Sunday, and MONDAY CLOSURES at several of them, which is the commonest wasted day. The amphitheatre closes sections for summer performances. LES FERRERES AQUEDUCT is open ground with no hours and no ticket. The cathedral and the archaeological museum keep their own separate hours.