Cartagena, Spain

As you approach CARTAGENA, the surrounding rusting mineworks are not a pretty sight. Only when you reach the old part of town down by the port, with its narrow medieval streets, packed with bars and restaurants, does the city's real character emerges.

Cartagena was Hannibal's capital city on the Iberian peninsula, named after his Carthage in North Africa, and a strategic port and administrative centre for the Romans. International Nautical Week is celebrated here in June. In July, the Mar de Músicas festival presents some of the best in world music, and in November the city hosts both a nationally famous jazz festival and an International Festival of Nautical Cinema. The fiestas of Semana Santa are among the most elaborate in Spain.

Cartagena's bus station is on c/Trovero Marín, with the FEVE train station (trains running to Los Nietos on the Mar Menor) almost next door and the RENFE station nearby at the end of Avenida América.

Places to stay are quite thin on the ground, with the lower-end options somewhat underwhelming. Pensión Oriente, c/Jara 27 (968 502 469; up to € 35), offers very basic, wooden-shuttered rooms in an old house with communal bath. The comfortable Hotel Los Habaneros, c/San Diego 60 (968 505 250, www.hotelhabaneros.com; € 71-100), is nicely convenient, being round the corner from the bus and train stations, while the sleek NH Cartagena, Real 2, Plaza Héroes de Cavite (968 120 908, www.nh-hotels.com; € 71-100), flaunts plenty of fashionably elongated design inside a pagoda-style exterior.

Local bars and restaurants fill the old town. Many of the most characterful places are strung along c/Mayor, just off the Plaza del Ayuntamiento. El Mejillonera, c/Mayor 4, does fine Gallego-style pulpo. For more upmarket food, head to the chic Azafrán, c/Palma 3 (968 523 172; closed Mon dinner & Sun), within striking distance of Plaza de España and serving pricey, gourmet variations on local specialities, including aromatic arroces. Mare Nostrum, down by the port (968 522 131), also offers excellent seafood dishes (€ 16–20), including mero marinera, grouper with clams and crayfish.