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Spain is a diverse land, where visitors can ski down a snow capped mountain, cycle through a lush green valley, cross arid desert lands and relax on a golden sandy beach all in the same twenty four hours. Spain is over a quarter of a million square miles of enormous variety – terrain, climate, religion, art, culture, and history, even language all vary widely throughout the vast country. The country’s two largest cities, Madrid and Barcelona, are further evidence of this diversity. Madrid is open and appealing. Bustling, and unpretentious, its old quarter is a winding maze of simple harmony, surrounded by elegant civic buildings, parks, boulevards, and landmarks of the modern city. Barcelona is the Mediterranean metropolis of excellence and yet at the same time open to all cultural influences flowing in from beyond the Pyrenees. Its well-ordered and proportioned town grid has given it quarters of unrivalled beauty, such as the Gothic Quarter, Las Ramblas and the modernist Paseo de Gracia. Alicante, the capital of the Costa Blanca, one of the country’s most important seaside resort areas, is a picturesque city which retains the appeal of its relaxed, easy-going lifestyle, while Palma, capital of the Balearic Isles, unites an old quarter, rich in Moorish remains and Gothic art, with a modern yacht basin, marina and tourist trade, and Ibiza, originally founded by the Carthaginians, is today a world-famous tourist destination, with a stunning Old Quarter of winding alleys and streets huddled inside its walls. Going from north to south, mention must be made of: Bilbao, fundamental industrial centre and pioneer in urban reclamation and Art (the Guggenheim Museum); Pamplona, the capital of Navarre, which combines its medieval quarters with the universal attraction of the annual running of the bulls during the fiestas of San Fermin.
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