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Direccion
Address Palacio de los Verdugo
C/ Lope Nuñez, 4
05001 Ávila (Ávila)
Concejalía de Patrimonio
 
Telefono
Telephone 920 35 00 00
 
Visitas mensuales18770

The walls in figures

 

The walls are a UNIVERSAL monument. We all have an image of this great milestone in military architecture that has become a milestone in the history of art.

It comes as no surprise that the walls are admired for their grandeur and spectacular appearance: the perimeter measures 2516 m in length and there are 87 turrets and 9 gates. Their elevation is finished off with no fewer than 2500 merlons (a merlon is the part of the parapet between two crenels).

If our walls can be proud of anything, they can be proud of being the best-conserved city walls in the world. There are similar constructions in Europe, such as the walls of Carcassone in France (which also have a perimeter of almost 3 km in length) and, in Spain, the Roman walls of Lugo (2266 m), those of León (incomplete), which date from the same period, and those of Pamplona, which were built later than the Walls of Ávila.

For centuries, this huge construction has been appreciated as artistic heritage and it was designated as a National Monument in 1884, a Historical-Artistic Heritage Site in 1982 and a World Heritage Site in 1985, together with the city's historical centre. 

Visitors can today walk along 1700 m of the allure and there are four entrance points, one of which is suitable for the disabled.

Each year, the allure is visited by approximately 200,000 people, who enjoy the marvellous views that are to be seen from the top of the monument.

Approximately 75% of visitors come from Spain and almost one third of them from Madrid. However, distance is not a factor for visitors interested in seeing the walls and those from Madrid are followed on the ranking (in number) by those from Andalusia, Valencia, Catalonia and the Basque Country. The walls are also visited by a large number of people from Castilla y León.

Foreign visitors include Europeans, especially from France and Germany but also from Italy, Great Britain and Portugal, and a growing number of people from the United States and Japan.

The walls are one of the city's main attractions: 27% of tourists say that their main reason for visiting the city is to see the walls and 66% say that they are the monument that best identifies Ávila.

(Figures taken from the 2009 report on tourist activity by the Tourist Observatory of the City of Ávila).