León

The 07:35 Alvia from Madrid Chamartín is still climbing when the conductor announces arrival in León. Look out of the right-hand window and you’ll see why: the Meseta’s flat cereal plains have given way to the first ridges of the Cordillera Cantábrica, the city’s cathedral spires rising between poplar trees and the Bernesga river. At 837 m, León is high enough to make January mornings bitingly cold and July afternoons surprisingly hot—pack a fleece even in May.

Most foreign visitors speed straight past on the A-66 motorway, which is why the old town still feels lived-in rather than embalmed. Spanish weekenders and Camino walkers share the stone arcades with law students from the university’s 13th-century halls; the baker on Calle Ancha will sell you a bocadillo while apologising that the bread isn’t as good as his grandmother’s. Tourism exists, but it hasn’t yet become the city’s day job.

Morning light, Gothic glass

Between 08:30 and 09:30 the cathedral unlocks its doors for misa—and lets the merely curious slip in free. Early light strikes the 1,800 m² of 13th-century glass, throwing crimson pools across the nave that shift from rose to bruise-purple as the sun climbs. British architecture buffs routinely call it “the best stained glass outside Chartres”; what they don’t mention is the temperature drop once you leave the south porch—stone walls this thick stay frigid until Easter. If you arrive later, the €6 ticket still feels cheap compared with Spanish grandes further south.

Round the corner, the Royal Collegiate of San Isidoro keeps tighter hours. English-language tours leave on the hour and last forty minutes, long enough to explain why a small northern church contains the bones of twenty-three Leonese monarchs and a 12th-century fresco cycle nicknamed the “Sistine Chapel of Romanesque”. The guide will also point out where the 1808 French troops stabled their horses and left bullet pocks in the choir stalls—history here is never picturesque for long.

Lunch at four, dinner at ten

Leonese eating times punish the punctual British stomach. Kitchens close at 16:00 and reopen around 20:30; the trick is to treat lunch as the main event. A weekday menú del día in the Barrio Húmedo costs €12–€14 and usually covers three courses, a carafe of local Bierzo wine and the sort of almond tarta that makes you forgive the 1980s tablecloth. Specialities to look for are cecina—air-dried beef silkier than bresaola—and morcilla de León, a rice-stuffed blood sausage milder than any UK black pudding. If you’re still peckish at 17:00, Café Bar Alba on the Plaza Mayor will fry churros to order and dip them in chocolate thick enough to stand a spoon in.

The same square doubles as the city’s outdoor living room once the sun drops. Students start with €1 cañas in Calle Burgo Nuevo around 21:00; by midnight the crawl has spilled into cobbled lanes where every drink arrives with a free plate—perhaps manteca colorada (spiced pork lard on bread) or a wedge of tortilla big enough to count as supper. Noise ordinances kick in at 03:00, but rubbish lorries clanking past the awnings are the only real hint of dawn.

Pilgrims, parador and contemporary concrete

León’s stretch of the Camino Francés enters from the wheat fields of Villadangos and exits towards the vineyards of Villar de Mazarife. Backpacks lean against every bar stool in summer, and the municipal albergue behind the cathedral turns away latecomers by 13:00. Even if you’re not walking, the pilgrim presence shapes the city: laundrettes open at dawn, pharmacies sell blister plasters in vending machines, and the Parador de San Marcos—once the Knights’ hospital—still offers a cut-price menú de peregrino at lunchtime beneath its 100-metre Plateresco façade.

Contrast that sandstone grandeur with the MUSAC, the region’s contemporary art museum, set fifteen minutes’ walk north-east among apartment blocks most maps ignore. The building’s kaleidoscopic glass panels were based on a scan of a stained-glass window in the cathedral, but the interior is pure 21st century: white walls, industrial trusses and rotating shows that lean towards video installations rather than Goya. Entry is €3, or free on Tuesday afternoons when local teenagers use the foyer as a skate park.

Into the hills (but check the forecast)

The mountains you glimpse from the cathedral roof terrace aren’t a backdrop—they’re a day trip. The Puerto de Pajares pass, at 1,378 m, is 45 minutes by regional train and puts you on the edge of the Ubiña massif, where bear tracks sometimes appear in spring mud. Hiking maps sold in the librería on Plaza de Regla mark half a dozen circuits, but buses are sporadic and weather moves in fast; a sunny departure can turn to sleet by early afternoon, so carry a waterproof even in June. In winter the same line serves the small ski resort of San Isidro—handy if you fancy empty slopes, less handy if heavy snow strands you overnight.

Back in the city, the Bernesga riverside path gives a flatter workout: 5 km of cycling track linking the Roman walls near the bus station to the football stadium on the western edge. Locals jog here after work, but keep your phone in your pocket—cyclists treat the lane as a velodrome.

What to take home and what to leave

Sunday morning’s flea market in Plaza de Santa María fills up with cháchara—brass door knobs, 1970s Chamartín railway timetables, the occasional Franco-era medal—while the covered food hall on Calle Gil y Carrasco sells vacuum-packed cecina that passes UK customs and spicy picos breadsticks that won’t. If you’re travelling light, pick up a bottle of Bierzo mencía; the wine is light enough to drink chilled and survives the Ryanair luggage carousel.

Don’t bother with the city’s only souvenir T-shirt shop; do bother to look up at balconies draped in fading republican flags or the No a la mina graffiti—León province still argues about an open-cast gold mine that threatens surrounding valleys. The debate is a reminder that this isn’t a heritage theme park but a regional capital negotiating its next chapter.

Leave before the festival of San Juan (23-29 June) if you dislike crowds; arrive then if you want bonfires on the riverbank and processions that finish with caldillo (garlic soup) served from cauldrons at 03:00. Accommodation prices jump, but the atmosphere is less touristy than Seville’s Feria and you won’t need a costume—just stamina and a tolerance for orujo liqueur at dawn.

Last orders

León won’t hand you the instant postcard of Moorish patios or sun-splashed Andalusian plazas. Instead it offers Gothic light filtered through student laughter, mountain air mixed with bar smoke, and a pace that lets you choose between midnight tapas or a 07:30 train into empty hills. Turn up expecting Spain-by-numbers and you might leave underwhelmed; arrive prepared for cold mornings, late dinners and conversations that start with “¿Haces el Camino?” and you’ll understand why so many walkers break their journey here—and why some never quite start again.