Spain holidays, tourist and information - SOL Spain On Line

Spain On Line

Turismo en España

Spain is a very popular destination for holidays because of it's unlimited tourist and travel options.

Whether you go on family holidays, romantic holidays or adventure holidays, Spain always offers travel destinations and tourist activities that match your holiday preferences and budget.

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Spain

Spain (España) is officially: the kingdom of Spain.

It is a democracy that is organised as a parliamentary monarchy. Spain has been member of the European Union since the year 1986 and is in the top ten of world economies (by nominal GPD). The spanish flag is a red and yellow striped triband.

Geography

Spain is a country in the south-west of Europe, only conected with the rest of the continent by it's northern border with France. To the west it borders with Portugal.

The rest of Spain is surrounded by water: the mediterrenean sea to the east and south and the Atlantic ocean to the west and north (actually: the Bay of Biscay). See the map of Spain!

Except for the mainland, Spain also has two island groups:

• the Balearic Islands in the mediterrenean sea:
  Mallorca, Ibiza, Menorca and Formentera
• Canary Islands or Canaries in the atlantic ocean off the coast of Africa:
  Gran Canaria, Tenerife, Fuerteventura, Lanzarote, La Gomera, La Palma and El Hierro

and two small exclaves in the north of Morroco: Ceuta and Melilla.

Spain has a surface of a little bit over 500,000 km² (almost 200,000 mi²), this is somewhat larger than the US state of California and makes it country number 51 in the world's ranking of size.

The spanish mainland is dominated by high plateaus and mountain ranges, of which the highest is found in the National Reserve of Sierra Nevada in the southern region of Andalusia. Spain has the highest mean altitude of the European countries, after Switserland of course. At the same time Spain has also one of the most extensive coastlines with excellent and very popular beaches.

The beaches of Spain

Following the beache from south-west to north-east you find:

• beaches of la Costa de la Luz - the coast of light
  provinces of Huelva and Cádiz
  
• beaches of la Costa del SOL - the coast of the sun
  provinces of Málaga and Granada
  
• beaches of la Costa Blanca - the white coast
  provinces of Almeria, Murcia and Alicante
  
• beaches of la Costa del Azahar - the orange blossom coast
  provinces of Valencia and Castellón de la Plana
  
• beaches of la Costa Dorada - the gold coast
  province of Tarragona
  
• beaches of la Costa Brava - the wild coast
  provinces of Barcelona and Girona

Political divisions and main cities in Spain

Spain is divided in 17 autonomous regions (AR) most of which are then divided in several provincies. The capitals of the autonomous regions are among the biggest and best known cities of Spain.

The biggest cities of Spain with their number of inhabitants are:

1. Madrid - 5.94 million
   Capital city of Spain and of the region of Madrid with only 1 province
2. Barcelona - 5.32 million
   Capital city of the region of Cataluna with 3 provinces
3. Valencia - 1.62 million
   Capital city of the region of la Comunidad Valenciana with 3 provinces
4. Sevilla (home of SOL) - 1.31 million
   Capital city of the region of Andalusia, with 8 provinces
5. Málaga - 1.07 million
   Also in the region of Andalusia. A port of certain importance and main city of the Costa del SOL
6. Bilbao (Vizcaya) - 946 thousand
   In the region of Euskadi (Basque), the capital is Vitoria

All spanish provinces and their capital cities

Spanish news

The main spanish newspapers online:

• El País
• El Mundo
• ABC