Ourense Travel Guide

 It is possible that the name Ourense has a Celtic origin, since the initial setting was the territory occupied by the thermal waters known As Burgas , even though the town, located on the left margin of the River Miño, has more connection to the Roman Auria.

In relation to this, some archaeological samples of the period are preserved in its Provincial Museum . Part of this building contains an original Roman construction, next to the sewers of Cervantes Street, of the same era, and the so called Puente Viejo or old Roman Bridge , one of the most beautiful and oldest in Europe, which gives access to the city.

The old centre of the city has been declared as a whole National Artistic and Historical Monument and it incorporates the principal monuments of Orense, the Cathedral, besides the Plaza Mayor built in the second half of the XII Century, and as the old Episcopal Palace. An example of the Swabian period, and, of the active Medieval social life are the columns in the façade of the Church of Santa María Madre.

These monuments have been undergoing transformations throughout their history. The Cathedral , a superimposition of Romanesque and Gothic, was not finished until the XVI Century and reconstructed, almost entirely, in the XIX Century. The current Church of Santa María Madre replaces another Romanesque one, lost for the most part in the XVIII Century.
It can be reached by a small staircase from the romantic Magdalena square. The transition from the Romanesque to the Gothic can be appreciated in the cloister of San Francisco, a convent which was rebuilt at the beginning of the XVI Century, on the current site, as a witness to the ecclesiastic fights of the city.

In the historic-civil buildings, stand out the house-palaces of the Boanes family, of the Oca-Valladares and the XVI and XVII arcades, which is the former jail of the Corona, and the ones that are next to the Hierro square, with its Renaissance fountain.

Placed between the Plaza Mayor (Main Square) and the Posio gardens, with its horse chestnut trees, is located the Church of the Santísima Trinidad, with an ogival portico and two cylindrical towers which flank the façade. Orense is also a place for good restaurants and taverns, which the traveller can find in Cervantes and San Miguel streets, in order to taste the good Ribeiro wine and one of the gastronomic specialities of Galicia, before going shopping in Habana Avenue or El Paseo.