Spain Guide
Cantabria and Asturias
Avilés
AVILÉS, 23km west from Gijón, once ranked among the most polluted cities in Europe. It is ringed by line upon line of grim factories, so that even the hardiest of travellers may be put off by the approach, but the city has worked hard to clean up its act and its image, and those who press on to the arcaded centre will not be disappointed.
Strewn with fourteenth- and fifteenth-century churches and palaces, Avilés' old town is extremely pleasant, and is home to most of the city's shops, bars and places to stay, as well as the pretty, walled Parque de Ferrera. Churches worth a closer look include the Romanesque San Nicolás de Bari, on c/San Francisco, and the thirteenth-century Santo Tomás. La Iglesia de los Padres Franciscanos contains the tomb of Don Pedro Menéndez de Avilés, the first governor of Spanish Florida, who founded the first European city in what is now the United States, St Augustine, in 1565.
There are also some superb palaces, especially the Baroque Camposagrado, in Plaza Camposagrado, built in 1663, and the seventeenth-century Palacio de Marqués de Ferrera in Plaza de España, now an expensive hotel. Around the corner on c/San Francisco is the city's most distinctive monument, the seventeenth-century Fuente de los Caños, with its six grotesque heads spouting water.
The area on and around plazas de España, Domingo Acebal and Carbayedo is full of promising bars and restaurants, especially along c/del Ferrería and c/Rivero. Both 
Casa Tataguyo at Plaza Carbayedo 6, a beautiful 1840s mesón (the oldest in town; closed mid-April to mid-May), and La Fragata, prettily sited near the church on Plaza Domingo Acebal, serve Asturian specialities and are moderately priced.