Jaguar Tour of Historic Northern Spain

1-13 October 2024

For years people have been talking about a tour  which covers some of the most important locations in the history of Spain—hard to choose but we had a go in 2023—It was a great success, and the Jaguar Enthusiasts Club Kent Region has asked for its own tour in 2024. We’re going to try and do even better!

We start on the ferry from Portsmouth with a Tuesday evening departure and two nights at sea to make new friends and rekindle old acquaintanceships. We arrive early into Santander so there is time for sightseeing on the way to our first stop, Segovia

Here there are the remains of many ages in Spain, including the Romans who built the aqueduct and the more recent people who built the Alcazar and the cathedral. There is a restaurant which dates back to medieval times and La Granja de San Ildefonsa where Charles V built a royal city is only a few miles away

After Segovia we’re off toward the Portuguese border to Ciudad Rodrigo. We are staying in the castle and highest point in town (you can climb the tower) Ciudad Rodrigo was besieged during the Peninsula war with the siege being eventually lifted by the Duke of Wellington. Salamanca is nearby and there are great walks around the walls and a Goya museum

Next we plunge south to Guadalupe, home of Our Lady of Guadalupe and a major place of pilgrimage even today. Only Santiago de Compostella is more venerated and in the middle ages gates were built to keep the pilgrims out, so many were sleeping in the town square. The driving in this area is unparalleled in Spain in its quality– a drivers dream!

After Guadalupe it’s Toledo. Two nights here so you can visit the Alcazar and get a view of Spanish history and conquests through different eyes. Toledo was famously besieged during the civil war and always had a reputation for excellent metalwork, including making swords that gave their users an edge when swashbuckling.

Up to this stage we haven’t  stayed in a castle with battlements and crenellations so Siguenza is our stop. It was central  to the early medieval civil wars (Pedro the Cruel had his wife—a Bourbon- incarcerated there) and during the civil war the republicans held the cathedral whilst the nationalists held the castle. There wasn’t much left when it was rebuilt as a hotel in the ‘60s

We finish inland at Argomaniz—a lovely little parador in a town where virtually no-one (fewer than 150) lives. Napoleon couldn’t hang on to Spain and the Duke of Wellington, plus the Spanish and the Portuguese saw to it that he was kicked out at the battle of Vitoria, Where did he sleep the night before? At what is now the parador…

On our final day we go to Santander where the city was recently forged by fire, after a fire and an onshore wind in 1941 destroyed anything which would burn, hence no medieval centre. We have a lunchtime departure on the ferry Salamanca for an evening arrival at Portsmouth

The trip will be limited to 20 cars and Jasper Gilder will accompany this group.