Village
Sanlúcar de Barrameda is a city of 70,000 inhabitants at the mouth of the Guadalquivir, facing the Doñana park, with city status since 1579. In 1297 it was granted in lordship to Guzmán el Bueno, founder of the lineage of the House of Medina Sidonia; between the 15th and 18th centuries it was a key port for exploration and trade with America, and from there the Magellan-Elcano expedition departed and returned, the first to circumnavigate the world. Its historic quarter was declared a historic-artistic site in 1973. It is today home to the cultivation of manzanilla wine, known for its gastronomy and for its horse races on the beach, of International Tourist Interest. The Barrameda in its name refers, in Arabic, to a sandbar that made navigation difficult.
Historical milestone
The Magellan-Elcano expedition, the first circumnavigation of the Earth, set out from Seville on 10 August 1519 with five ships; it sailed from Sanlúcar de Barrameda on 20 September, seeking a trade route to the Spice Islands by sailing westward. It crossed the Strait of Magellan on 28 November 1520 and reached the Philippines, where Ferdinand Magellan died in the Battle of Mactan on 27 April 1521. The expedition members reached the Moluccas and chose Juan Sebastián Elcano to captain the return journey around Africa. The carrack Victoria, the sole survivor, returned to Sanlúcar de Barrameda on 6 September 1522, the first vessel to sail around the world; towed upriver, it reached Seville with its cargo of spices on 8 September.
Historical milestone
A transoceanic expedition commanded by Christopher Columbus that set sail from Sanlúcar de Barrameda on 30 May 1498, with eight ships and a crew of 226 people, and which concluded with his arrival in Cádiz on 25 November 1500. Its purpose was to continue the exploration of the new lands on behalf of the Catholic Monarchs, and on it Columbus visited for the first time the northern coast of present-day Venezuela, reaching mainland after his first two voyages, which had focused on the islands of the Caribbean. From Sanlúcar, the fleet sailed south, avoiding a French fleet near Cape San Vicente, made a stopover in Madeira and La Gomera, and there it split up: six ships went to Hispaniola and Columbus continued with the remaining three, intending to reach mainland beyond the islands already known.
Monument
Fortress built by the Guzmán family in the 15th century in the Bajo de Guía quarter; the Catholic Monarchs visited it in 1477. Like the rest of Spain's castles, it has held generic protection since the Decree of 22 April 1949.
Monument
The church of Nuestra Señora de la O is the Iglesia Mayor of Sanlúcar de Barrameda and the main temple of its mother parish, of medieval origin, with a Gothic-Mudéjar doorway, whose fabric dates back to approximately 1360. It was declared a National Historic-Artistic Monument in 1931 and, as a Bien de Interés Cultural, forms part of the city's historic-artistic ensemble, recognised in 1973.
Nature
Sanlúcar is a gateway to Doñana National Park, on the other bank of the Guadalquivir; the Doñana site was inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1994. Doñana National Park was declared in 1969.
Food and drink
Fortified wine protected under the 'Manzanilla-Sanlúcar de Barrameda' Denomination of Origin, made exclusively in this town under the effect of biological ageing by the sea.
Food and drink
The town's signature seafood product, caught in the waters at the mouth of the Guadalquivir.
Curiosity
Horse races run on the beach sand since the 19th century, declared a Fiesta of National Tourist Interest in 1986 and of International Tourist Interest in 1997.
Monument
The historic residence of the Dukes of Medina Sidonia in Sanlúcar, home to the Archive of the House of Medina Sidonia, one of the most important private documentary collections in Spain for the study of modern history.
Monument
Built between 1853 and 1870 as the summer residence of Antonio de Orleans, Duke of Montpensier, and his wife the Infanta Luisa Fernanda, who chose Sanlúcar as their summer retreat from 1849 onward. Designed by Juan Talavera de la Vega and Balbino Marrón, it combines rooms in Egyptian, Anglo-Saxon, Rococo, Chinoiserie and Baroque styles. Today it is the seat of the Sanlúcar Town Hall.
Monument
The church of the former Dominican convent of Sanlúcar, today converted into a parish church, which preserves part of its original conventual fabric.
Monument
A manor house in Sanlúcar exemplifying the domestic architecture of the cargadores a Indias, merchants enriched by trade with the Americas who built their homes next to the port.
Nature
A stand of stone pine replanted since the early 19th century next to the mouth of the Guadalquivir, home to a colony of kites and bordering the Doñana marshes.
Nature
Wetlands included in the Inventory of Wetlands of Andalusia next to Bonanza beach, where black storks, cranes, flamingos, purple swamphens and coots can be observed.
Nature
Water springs declared of public utility in 1903, whose management was taken over by the Sanlúcar Town Hall in 1913. The Las Piletas spa, after a restoration, reopened its doors in 2003.
Historical milestone
Before the present-day Castillo de Santiago, Sanlúcar was defended by the so-called Castillo de las Siete Torres or Alcázar Viejo, a Muslim fortress around which the medieval urban layout was organized. Guzmán el Bueno, after receiving the town in 1297, ordered a wall of about 1,550 meters in perimeter built around it, remains of which are still preserved in the Albaicín quarter.
Historical milestone
On 4 April 1295 Guzmán el Bueno received the verbal promise of the lordship of Sanlúcar, officially confirmed on 13 October 1297. His descendants established the county of Niebla in 1369 and attained the title of Dukes of Medina Sidonia in 1445, establishing their permanent residence in the town from 1478.
Historical milestone
In the summer of 1796 Francisco de Goya stayed in Sanlúcar as a guest of the Duchess of Alba, widow of the Duke of Medina Sidonia. During that stay he produced the so-called Album A and part of Album B of his drawings.
Historical milestone
Ever since Sancho IV authorized Sanlúcar in 1295 to hold two free annual fairs, the town hosted each year the 'vendeja' proper (between September and November) and the 'racavendeja' (between February and March), attended mainly by Breton merchants selling linen cloth and buying wine. In 1478 the Duke of Medina Sidonia granted them the Privilege of the Bretons to facilitate their settlement.
Curiosity
Sanlúcar is mentioned in Cantiga 371 of Alfonso X's Cantigas de Santa María, in chapter III of the first part of Cervantes's 'Don Quixote,' and in a fragment of Lope de Vega's play 'Amar, servir y esperar.'
Curiosity
A Corten-steel equatorial sundial three meters in diameter, the work of Alfonso Sáez Aguiar, unveiled at the autumn equinox of 2011 on the Bajo de Guía promenade to commemorate the starting point of the first circumnavigation of the globe by the Magellan-Elcano expedition.