Highlights

Itinerary

This itinerary represents our plan for the program. However, we may implement changes if we identify opportunities to improve the experience, to take advantage of unexpected events, or to accommodate local schedule changes.

Departure • Travel Day • Meet your student travel group and one of your trip leaders in New York and fly together to Lisbon, Portugal.

Lisbon, Portugal • 4 days • Begin your journey in Lisbon, one of the oldest continually inhabited cities in the world. Stroll past Phoenician ruins that exist side by side with Gothic cathedrals and modern wonders such as the Museum of Art, Architecture, and Technology (MAAT). Learn how Lisbon’s famed seven hills and location at the mouth of the Tagus River influenced its development, and what changes were wrought by the cataclysmic earthquake of 1755. Take a day trip to nearby Sintra, home of several 19th century palaces with vivid pink, yellow, and red walls, a Moorish castle, and a mansion that once housed the initiation ceremonies of the Knights Templar.

Cáceres, Spain • 3 days • From Lisbon, head east into Spain. Stop first in the town of Évora, home to a second century Roman Temple, and then continue on to Cáceres, whose historic old town is a UNESCO World Heritage site where Roman, Islamic, Gothic, and Renaissance structures both blend and compete for attention. Discuss the cultural melting pot which defines this ancient city while sitting in the shade of the olive grove at the heart of the Jewish Quarter, and see vestiges of the multi-tower defense system built by the Moorish rulers in the 11th and 12th centuries.

Madrid, Spain • 3 days • By contrast to Cáceres and Lisbon, Madrid is a relatively new city, with less than 500 years under its belt as an urban center. Delve into some of the modern ideas that influenced its urban planning—from the trade and service neighborhoods surrounding the 18th century palace to the impressive public gardens of Retiro Park, with its glass and iron Crystal Palace and unique monument to “The Fallen Angel.”  Visit the second century B.C. Egyptian Temple of Dobod before stepping out on the pitch of the modern-day sports “temple” of Santiago Bernabeu. Here, your Smithsonian Student Travel Expert joins the program to share their insights into Spanish art and culture. Examine modern masterpieces by Picasso and Dalí at the renowned Reina Sofía Museum, and see the dynamic tensions of the everyday lives of royalty and peasant classes as depicted by Goya and Velázquez at the world-class Prado Museum. Step into a modern day polemic as you meet with an architect to examine the impacts of recently reclaimed pedestrian streets that rollback automotive access to the city center.

Barcelona, Spain • 4 days • Even to this day, architects and urban planners around the world look to Barcelona, and in particular Gaudí and his fellow modernists, for inspiration. Peel back layers of this vibrant city, from the cobblestoned Gothic Quarters to the revolutionary grid and courtyard system of the Eixample, to the iconic effusiveness of Gaudí’s Parque Güell, Casa Batlló, and still unfinished Sagrada Familia Basílica. Visit the Picasso Museum, housed inside a medieval palace. This museum holds over 4,000 of the artist’s works. See the ongoing impacts of the 1992 Summer Olympics and the urban renewal that accompanied them and pick one of the city’s many vibrant neighborhoods to do your own architectural use case and redesign survey as a fitting end to your Iberian journey.

Return • Travel Day • Fly from Barcelona, Spain, to New York with your group and a trip leader, then continue on to your final destination.