Toledo
UNESCO World Heritage Site (Historic City Of Toledo, Inscribed 1986), Capital Of Visigothic And Then Castilian Spain Before Madrid, And The Surviving Record Of Christian, Muslim And Jewish Coexistence · Toledo, Castilla-La Mancha
The capital of Spain before Madrid was anything, built on a granite outcrop inside a loop of the Tagus so tight that the city is almost an island. For several centuries Christians, Muslims and Jews lived and worked here at the same time, and the buildings are the evidence: a cathedral that is among the great Gothic churches of Europe, two surviving synagogues, one of them decorated with Arabic inscription by Muslim craftsmen for a Jewish patron, and mosques turned into churches without much altered. El Greco spent his working life here and the Burial of the Count of Orgaz still hangs in the church it was painted for. The whole hill is a single protected old town of steep lanes that were not designed for anyone in a hurry. Most visitors come from Madrid for five hours and leave, which is the one mistake to avoid: the day trippers go at six and the streets become the best thing about the place.
Plaza del Ayuntamiento, Toledo, Castilla-La Mancha, 45002, Spain
NO OPENING TIME HERE WAS CHECKED, and the city itself has none: the old town is public and always open. What has hours are the monuments, and the important structural fact is that MANY CLOSE FOR A LONG MIDDAY BREAK and several close one day a week, which strands visitors who planned a continuous day. The cathedral keeps a shorter Sunday because of services. The combined monuments bracelet is sold at participating sites. The outdoor escalators run long daylight hours. Confirm the midday closures.