Whenever I travel to a place for the first time, I always go to Pinmapple to see where my trusted Hivers recommend visiting. Most of the time I find some pretty good inspiration. Like this time to La Coruna in Spain, I found two posts about the Tower of Hercules. I like lighthouses and have been to a couple in Taiwan recently. This one will make a nice contrast especially since it was built by the Romans.
According to Google map, the walk from La Coruna town to the Tower is less than 2km and takes about 45 min to walk, in reality it only took me about half an hour. The walk is lovely, the light gentle Atlantic breeze accompanying me, along the coast going slightly uphill. You barely notice that because the view is so consuming. I love the antiqued lamppost on the road, it adds so much character to the whole area, and look just so perfect in front of the Tower.
Once I got to the top of the hill, it's another short walk out towards the Tower. I imagine it would be quite a harsh walk during rain or shine. Luckily I got neither, just the perfect weather under the clear blue skies.
The Tower of Hercules is a UNESCO site and it is said to be the oldest surviving lighthouse that dates back to the Roman times in 1st BC Source. It cost €3 to enter, a very affordable price given its historical value. You can climb up to the top of the Tower, but I wasn't too bothered as I figured the view wouldn't be that different from ground level. I'd much rather view the actual tower itself, plus the view looking back to the town centre, and outwards towards the sea and the massive compass was really quite remarkable.
What I found quite unusual was the exterior of the tower. At 55 meters tall, it may seem a normal stone built structure, but if you look at it carefully you'll notice slanted ridges are built across the uniform stonework, almost like someone had taken a ruler and drew upward lines across the tower
Next stop back to town. I always try to find a market when I travel to Europe, in La Caruna it was half and half. I found a market and it looked promising from the outside. When I went inside, it was really impressive. Two curved sky windows split across the ceiling, and a larger one at the end of the building was snucked below them. What a beautiful sight. Sadly most of the market stalls were closed and there was only a handful of customers.
In the afternoon I spent the rest of the time walking around La Coruna town. The Maria Pita Plaza was a magnificent large square, flanked by the Town Hall on one side. Not sure what other buildings I missed as I had not made a list of the landmarks. There's probably a cathedral or church of some sort that I should have seen, there's always one in a European town or city.
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The port was on the other side of Maria Pita Plaza. It was pretty impressive to catch a glimpse of our cruise ship in between the buildings. It looks so small, but don't let your eyes deceive you here.
Across the road from the port and our cruise ship a bank of buildings lined the road. The small frame shutters look so pretty like a layer of intricate white lace covering the windows.
I spent the rest of my time in La Coruna just wandering around the town center as I couldn't venture too far away due to the limited time we had here.
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And very soon it was time to head back to our cruise ship for our next destination. I had Snowpea with me of course. If you have entered my HPUD Guessing Contest, you would have seen her around with me and probably confirmed one of the locations already. I will be announcing my May HPUD Guessing Contest tomorrow as there were loads of entries this month, just need a little time to get my announcement post together.
