Spain and Portugal for Visitors

The Prince of Asturias Foundation's most public activity is the eponymous annual awards it gives, perhaps second only to the Nobel Prizes. Its categories are the Arts, Communications and Humanities, International Cooperation, Literature, Social Sciences, Sports, Technical and Scientific Research, and Concord, and its recipients are a clever balance of world-famous names (Bob Dylan, Rafa Nadal, Google...) and less well-known, even obscure ones (Adolfo Suarez, the Biosphere Reserve network, Tzvetan Todorov...). The Premios Principe de Asturias are announced at intervals throughout the year, which also helps to maintain interest, and presented in the autumn, in the Campoamor Theatre in Oviedo.

I like this site. For one thing, it's nicely made, informative, usable and appropriately elegant, by a local advertising firm called Impact5, and for another, it is not often that you see the military uprising of 1934 which started the Spanish Civil War called what it was, a "revolution" (the nearest you usually hear is "rebellion"). It is referred to on these pages about Oviedo's fine opera company because the city's Teatro Campoamor was deliberately burned down by the Republicans (the loyalists, remember), to prevent it being used by the rebel fascists to attack the adjacent barracks which it overlooked. The rebuilt theatre is best known in the world as the location for the annual Prince of Asturias Award ceremony. The website linked to here also contains full details - only in Spanish, unfortunately - about the opera season, the company, related activities such as recitals and film showings, and more, but lacks online ticket purchase, for which you will need to find the website of the local savings bank, cajAstur.

The capital of the province and principality of Asturias (they are the same thing), Oviedo is famous for its Romanesque architecture and for having put up a statue to Woody Allen, who was captivated by the place when he visited. This municipal website is princely in quality, being, so far as I can see, impeccable, accessible, fast, entertaining and informative, and I could go on with the praise at length. Should be a model for municipal websites.

The main reason for classifying Oviedo as a World Heritage site is its pre-Romanesque architecture.

Spanish-only website.