Things to do in Zaragoza

Landmark · Riverside, old town

The vast baroque basilica with eleven tiled domes on the bank of the Ebro, and the enormous square in front of it that the city uses as its living room.

Local tip: Take the lift up the Torre de San Juan for the view along the river — almost no visitor does, it costs very little, and it is the only vantage point that explains how the basilica sits against the Ebro. Then walk fifty metres to La Seo, the other cathedral, whose Mudéjar exterior wall is the better building.

Landmark · West of the centre

An eleventh-century Islamic palace, later a Christian royal residence and now the Aragonese parliament — the northernmost great work of Andalusi architecture in Spain.

Local tip: It is UNESCO-listed as part of the Mudéjar architecture of Aragón and it is genuinely world-class, but because it doubles as a working parliament the opening hours are irregular. Check the day before, book ahead, and go for the Taifa-period courtyard rather than the Catholic Monarchs' upper floor.

Food · Behind Plaza del Pilar

A knot of narrow lanes packed with tapas bars, each one known for a single dish, where Zaragoza actually eats.

Local tip: The rule is one tapa per bar and then move — bars here specialise, and staying put means eating the worse half of a menu. Ask for the house speciality rather than reading the list, and do not start before 9pm on a weekend or you will be alone.

Culture · Old town, four separate sites

Zaragoza is built directly on a Roman colony, and four museums cover the forum, the river port, the public baths and a 6,000-seat theatre.

Local tip: Buy the combined ticket for all four — it costs barely more than one and they take half a day together. The theatre is the one to see if you only do one, and the river port museum is the one nobody visits despite being the only excavated Roman river port in Spain.

Nature · South of the centre, and along the river

The city's big formal park on the rise above the centre, plus the rebuilt riverside walks that came out of the Expo 2008 works.

Local tip: The park's Fuente de la Hispanidad steps are the local running route. Along the river, walk from the Puente de Piedra west to the Expo site to see the Pabellón Puente — a Zaha Hadid bridge-building that most residents have not been inside — and be aware that the riverside is where the cierzo hits hardest.

Neighborhood · Between Plaza del Pilar and the old walls

A restored 1903 iron-and-glass market hall with the Roman wall on one side and the city's most walkable food streets on the other.

Local tip: The market reopened after a long restoration and the stalls are genuinely for locals rather than tourists. Buy borrajas — a stalk vegetable barely eaten outside Aragón — and ask the stallholder what to do with them; that conversation is the fastest way to be treated as a resident rather than a visitor.