Destination Guide
Spain is a country in southwestern Europe with territories in Africa. Its capital is Madrid.
Destinations covered
12
Published guides
30
Region
Travel guide
Explore Spain
Discover cities, regions and experiences worth building a trip around, then go deeper with practical guides and local context.
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City
Barcelona is a city and municipality in Catalonia, Spain. Barcelona City Council's history page traces it from the small Roman city of Bàrcino through the medieval Count's City (Ciutat Comtal) to the industrial city it calls the economic driving force of today's Catalonia.
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11 destinations
Bilbao is a city and municipality in the Basque Country and the capital of the province of Biscay, home to the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao since 1997. XTOUR maps the Guggenheim and the Bilbao Fine Arts Museum in the city, and keeps the Vizcaya Bridge (Portugalete and Getxo) and San Juan de Gaztelugatxe (Bermeo) apart, because they lie outside it.
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Córdoba is a city and municipality in the province of Córdoba, Andalusia, Spain, on the Guadalquivir. XTOUR maps the Mosque-Cathedral, the Alcázar of the Christian Monarchs, the Roman Bridge and the Synagogue in the city, and Medina Azahara, which lies within the same municipality but outside the city.
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Granada is a municipality in Andalusia and the capital of the province of Granada; Andalusia's official tourism site dates the founding of the Nasrid dynasty to 1238 and the Catholic Monarchs' taking of the kingdom of Granada to 1492. XTOUR maps places inside the municipality, among them the Alhambra, the Generalife, the cathedral and the Royal Chapel.
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Madrid is the capital of Spain and of the Community of Madrid. San Lorenzo de El Escorial, where the Royal Monastery stands, is a separate municipality in the same region, and Toledo and Segovia are municipalities in Castilla-La Mancha and Castile and León; none of them is part of the city of Madrid.
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Málaga is a municipality in Andalusia and the capital of the province of Málaga; Andalusia's official tourism site describes its old centre around the cathedral, the Alcazaba, Gibralfaro Castle and the Roman Theatre. XTOUR maps those places and the Museo Picasso Málaga at their own locations inside the municipality.
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Palma is a city on Mallorca and the capital of the Balearic Islands. XTOUR maps places in the city itself, such as the cathedral, the Almudaina palace, Bellver Castle and Es Baluard, and keeps places elsewhere on Mallorca, such as the Caves of Drach at Porto Cristo, apart from it.
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San Sebastián (Donostia) is a coastal city in the Basque Country and capital of the province of Gipuzkoa, laid out along La Concha Bay between Mount Urgull and Mount Igeldo. XTOUR maps La Concha Beach, the San Telmo Museum and the Basilica of Santa María del Coro in the city, and Monte Igueldo, the hill at one end of the bay.
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Santiago de Compostela is the capital of Galicia, whose cathedral by tradition holds the relics of Saint James the Apostle and whose historic centre is a UNESCO World Heritage site, according to Spain's national tourism board. XTOUR maps the cathedral and the Museum of Pilgrimages and Santiago in the city, and keeps the Camino de Santiago routes apart because they are not a place.
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Seville (Sevilla) is a municipality in Andalusia, Spain, whose cathedral, Real Alcázar and Archive of the Indies UNESCO inscribed together as one World Heritage property in 1987. XTOUR maps places inside the municipality, among them those three, María Luisa Park, the Torre del Oro and Casa de Pilatos; Itálica, in Santiponce, is not part of it.
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Toledo is a city in central Spain, capital of the province of Toledo and of Castilla-La Mancha, whose city council's tourism site describes it as a UNESCO World Heritage city. XTOUR maps the cathedral, the Alcázar, the Sephardic Museum and the monastery of San Juan de los Reyes, all inside the city.
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Valencia (València) is the capital city of the Valencian Community in Spain, crossed by the Turia Garden in the old bed of the River Turia. XTOUR maps places inside the city, such as its cathedral, the Lonja de la Seda, the Central Market and the Museum of Fine Arts, at their own locations.
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Plan better
According to the Patronato's own pages, an Alhambra general ticket is a day ticket with one fixed appointment inside it: the time printed for the Nasrid Palaces. This guide explains who runs the monument, what the general ticket and the gardens ticket cover, and the rules the Patronato publishes on names, identity documents and children.
The Palau de la Música Catalana and the former Hospital de Sant Pau are both by Lluís Domènech i Montaner and share one UNESCO listing, but one is a working concert hall and the other a former hospital site, run by different foundations with different visit rules. This guide sets out what each visit is, who runs it, how the combined tickets work, and where each operator's own pages contradict themselves.
Bilbao's two big art museums collect different centuries and are run by different foundations: the Guggenheim shows art from the mid-twentieth century on, the Fine Arts Museum covers the thirteenth century to the present and reopened in October 2026 after its Foster and Uriarte extension. This guide sets out what each holds, who runs it, how the shared combo ticket works, and where the museums' own pages disagree.
Bilbao and San Sebastián are the two Basque cities XTOUR treats as bases, and they hold different things: Bilbao the Guggenheim, its old town and the estuary, San Sebastián its bay, beaches and Old Part. This guide sets out what is in each city, what lies outside it, such as the Bizkaia Bridge and San Juan de Gaztelugatxe, and what XTOUR does not know.
The Caminito del Rey is a regulated, one-way walkway in the Gaitanes gorge, and every visitor needs a ticket booked for a date and an entry time. This guide sets out who runs it, what the operator's rules say about booking, age, kit and groups, how the linear route and the shuttle fit together, and where the operator's own pages disagree.
The Camino de Santiago is not one path but a family of pilgrimage routes that end at the tomb of St James in Santiago de Compostela's cathedral. This explainer covers who certifies a pilgrimage, what the Compostela requires, how the main routes in Spain differ on the official pages, and why XTOUR lists the city and the cathedral but not the routes themselves.
UNESCO inscribed flamenco in 2010 as song, dance and guitar together, with Andalusia as its heartland but roots in Murcia and Extremadura too. Andalusia's Statute of Autonomy makes flamenco the region's own responsibility, and official sources describe peñas, tablaos, festivals and public theatres as the places it is performed.
Modernisme is the Catalan form of the turn-of-the-century movement known elsewhere as Art Nouveau, and in Barcelona it is the work of many architects, not only Gaudí. Barcelona's own Modernisme Route and the buildings' operators show when it began, why its end date is disputed, and how Gaudí, Lluís Domènech i Montaner and Josep Puig i Cadafalch differ, building by building.
Gibraltar is not part of Spain: the UK government calls it a British Overseas Territory, while Spain calls it a colony and maintains its claim. This explainer sets out what each government says, what the 2026 UK-EU agreement on Gibraltar changes at the land border, and why XTOUR files nothing in Gibraltar under Spain.
Seville, Granada, Córdoba and Málaga are XTOUR's four Andalusian bases, and each is built around different monuments run by different bodies, with different booking rules. This guide sets out what Andalusia's official tourism site places in each city, who runs each anchor monument, which sites the sources place on a city's outskirts or out in its province, and what XTOUR does not know.
The Prado, the Reina Sofía and the Thyssen-Bornemisza overlap in period but differ in what each was built to collect. This guide sets out what each collection covers, how the Thyssen-Bornemisza came to belong to the Spanish state, the pass that covers all three, and what XTOUR does not know about visiting them.
The Royal Palace of Madrid is run by Patrimonio Nacional, the body that manages Spain's royal sites, and it remains the King's official residence. This guide sets out what the standard visit, the guided visit, the Royal Kitchen and the combined ticket with the Royal Collections Gallery each are, how Patrimonio Nacional's own pages describe booking, and where those pages disagree.
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