Ávila is a beautiful city with a lot of history. The greatest tourist attraction that it has and that is undoubtedly known throughout the world: the Walls of Ávila , a spectacular Romanesque military fence that surrounds the old part of the city and that both, together with the churches outside the walls, are World Heritage Site . The walls are undoubtedly a very important factor in the city and historically they have participated in the distribution of urban space, formerly being the representation of the separation between the wild and the civilized space.
The Walls of Ávila have a perimeter of two and a half kilometers, 2,500 battlements, 88 towers and 9 gates that occupy an area of 33 hectares and that form a perfect rectangle that is oriented from east to west. The thickness of the walls is 3 meters and their height is 12. Its construction was made with materials that came from the Roman necropolis , civil constructions or old Roman and Visigothic walls. The stone that forms it is gray or black granite, depending on its origin.
The gates in the wall are spectacular and each one has its own story. The Puerta del Alcázar is the most solemn of the entire wall and is made up of two towers linked by a bridge. The Puerta de San Vicente is very similar to the previous one, in fact, the one at the Alcázar was made inspired by it. The Torreón del Alcázar was built to make the wall taller and to give more power to those who inhabited it.
If you are going to visit Ávila, without a doubt, the first place you should go is here. You can access 1,400 meters of its length through three different entrances, the Casa de las Carnicerías , the Puerta del Alcázar and the Arco del Carmen. There is an elevator so that people with reduced mobility can also do the tour.