Madrid and Barcelona

Spain's two great cities could not be more different from each other, and that contrast is exactly what makes this eight-day itinerary worth building a course around. Madrid is formal, monumental, and rooted in Castilian tradition — a capital city where the Prado's galleries and the grand Plaza Mayor tell roughly five centuries of Spanish imperial and artistic history in a single afternoon's walk. Barcelona arrives as a counterpoint: Catalan in identity, Mediterranean in mood, and visually unlike almost anywhere else in Europe. Spending real time in both cities, rather than skimming through either, gives students the chance to hold two versions of Spanish culture side by side and ask why they diverged.