Caves & Castles

We left our park up in Elvas at 10am and it took just over an hour to drive the 55 miles back into Spain and arrive at our parking spot in Merida.
2000 years ago this town was known as Augustas Emerita for the thousands of years the romans were here. It was a massive and very important Roman town with visits from Augustas, Julias Ceaser, Marc Anthony and Nero which shows how long this town has been established. It had an amphitheatre, theatre, temple of Diana, Roman baths, a Roman circus or racetrack as we would call it. A court house and other judicial buildings, not to mention the town itself and the various businesses you would normally find in a town. Basically Augustas Emerita was massive in its day.
Our first stop was the amphitheatre and theatre where we brought a combined ticket to visit all locations dotted across the city for €17 each.
The amphitheatre was really impressive and we actually walked in seating area. Walked down the steps that the dignitaries would have used and walked through where the gladiators would have waited before going out. It was amazing to get so close and to touch the stone pillars that are over 2000 years old.
Next to the amphitheatre is the Theatre and it’s pretty intact and is still used for performing arts today. It’s difficult to comprehend how the pillars were made and how the blocks of stone that are bigger than me were put in place.
From the theatres we crossed the road to the Casa del teatre or the house of the theatre. This house probably belonged to a Roman dignitary as it was massive and had a courtyard for greeting people.
Some of the mosaics were still on the floor in some of the rooms. They are incredibly intricate.
From the House we travelled on foot through the city to the Alcazar or ancient fort. This was once Roman and housed the Roman army but sometime after the romans left the Muslims invaded this region and built the fort we see today from some of the old Roman buildings and then they renamed the town Merida.
From the Alcazar we headed back towards our parking area cutting through the city and visiting the Trajan Arch which was the main entrance to Augustas Emirita. Once the Muslims arrived the only entrance was over the old Roman bridge as the whole city was walled in. After the arch we visited the Basilica of Santa Eulalia and its underground crypt. The crypt was fascinating as there were hundreds of stone coffins underneath the Basilica and what is now the floor of the church used to be lower. Unfortunately there just wasn’t a lot of information in the crypt to tell us who was there and why.
By the time we got back to Wanda it was 5pm and we’d had a full day of walking covering 8km but it felt like more.Les mer