Hotel Santillana

Caterpillars

by andal13

Inside the butterflies' garden, I found an odd plant... instead of flowers, the plant had sky-blue caterpillars!!!!

En el jardín de mariposas, encontré una planta extraña... en lugar de flores, tenía orugas celestes!!!!

La Colegiata (5)

by andal13

Another view from the cloister.
I cannot describe with words the sensations I felt walking around this Romanesque jewel...

Otra vista del claustro.
No puedo describir con palabras las sensaciones que me invadieron mientras caminaba por esta joya románica...

Santillana del Mar

by nomad7890

"City of the three lies"

Santillana del Mar is often called the city of the three lies in Spanish - this is because:

-It is not saint (Santi)
-It is not flat (llana)
-It is not by the sea (del Mar)

It is however a wonderful place to spend a day visiting and exploring. Santillana is also on the northern route for the Camino de Santiago

SANTILLANA DEL MAR (1)

by AsturArcadia

The Hotel de los Infantes, on the main road to Barreda, is not quite what it appears to be. The façade was ‘imported’ from a ruined mansion in nearby Oreña, and behind it lies a modern accommodation block.

we enter the main part of the village via the cobbled calle de Santo Domingo. On the left is the early eighteenth century Palacio de Benemejís, which has a fine library and a collection of eighteenth and nineteenth century art. This was also the birthplace of the uncle of King Juan Carlos II, Carlos de Borbón Suila y Orléans. Almost directly opposite is a seventeenth century reconstruction of a much older mansion, belonging to the Villa family. The ‘escudo’ has the motto ‘A good death honours one’s entire life’. Not much use to one, though, is it, once one has snuffed it?

The calle Juan Infante branches off to the left, ascending gradually past a line of gift shops, to end at the Plaza de Ramón Pelayo. The Gil Blas Parador opened in 1927 as a private hotel, occupying a ‘palacio’ belonging to the Barreda y Bracho family, being incorporated in the chain of state-owned hostelries in 1944. The public rooms are worth an exploration for the price of a drink in the bar. The Torre de Don Borja is of late fifteenth or early sixteenth century origin. In the late 1800s it was owned by Paz de Borbón, Isabel II’s daughter, and since 1961 it has been the headquarters of the Fundación Santillana, a provincial cultural organisation. One of the oldest surviving buildings in the village is the Torre del Merino, built in the thirteenth century for the Merino (Governor) of Asturias de Santillana, and occupied by several generations of the Barreda family. The present-day Ayuntamiento (Town Hall) occupies an adjacent ‘palacio’.

From the junction between the calle Juan Infante and the calle de Santo Domingo, if one follows the latter street, one passes a whole string of notable mansions en route to the collegiate church. On the right, in the calle de Santo Domingo, are the Casa de Barreda, Casa de Peredo and the eighteenth century Casa de los Bustamante. Then, in the calle de la Carrera, is the fifteenth century Casa de los Velarde. In the calle del Cantón, on the left is the Hotel Altamira, of eighteenth century origin and originally known as the Casa de los Valdevieso. On the right are the Casa de Jesús Otero, the late fifteenth century Palacio de Leonor de Vega (she was the mother of Iñigo López de Mendoza), and the Casa de los Villa.

In the plaza in front of the church are, on the right, the eighteenth century Casa de Cossio and the Casa de Quevedo, and on the right the Casa de los Archiduques de Austria, built in the sixteenth or seventeenth century, and now occupied by an antiques shop.

Up a short flight of steps, guarded by a pair of stone lions (no, sorry to disappoint you, readers, but Big Cats do NOT feature among the considerable assortment of Cantabrian wildlife . . .), we come to the collegiate church of Santa Juliana, dating from either the late eleventh or early twelfth century, open to the public at most times of the day. The Plaza de Arenas, beyond the church, is dominated by the colossal Palacio de Velarde, dating from the sixteenth century.