Hola amigos, Stuart here from Spain Speaks today coming to you from the heart of Spain. I’m in the middle of Castilla-La Mancha in a city called Ciudad Real checking out what it’s like in a small city here in Spain and I’m going to have a look around and check it out from a quality-of-life point of view and also to see if it lives up to its reputation as one of the most peaceful cities in Spain so let’s go and check it out.
Now I’ve been working in Ciudad Real for the last two months – not on a full-time basis, on a part-time basis. I’ve been coming down here every Saturday for the last two months and one thing that has struck me about this city is just how quiet it seems to be.
Now some people say it’s a boring city, I don’t necessarily think that’s true of course. You’re not going to have a lot of things to do in a city like this compared to say Madrid, which is obviously a lot bigger than here.
I mean this is a population of 80,000 people very rural surroundings a lot of farmland surrounding here and of course this is a provincial capital and as you can see now it’s about 8:30 in the morning and it’s really quiet but that’s typical of cities here in Spain at this time of the day of course Castilla-la Mancha is where this saga took place the famous Don Quixote and here we have the famous Don Quixote and his offsider Sancho Panza over here and everywhere you go in the city you will be reminded of the Don Quixote story now this is a city where everything is a maximum of 15 to 20 minutes away on foot you can get around this city easily on a bike it is extremely flat and it has a reasonable public transport system from what I’ve seen so getting around the city no problems there of course lots of cars and parking could be a bit of an issue but we didn’t seem to have a problem yesterday to find a place to park now the proximity of this city to Madrid it’s about two hours away by car that 200 kilometers let’s say and there’s also a fast train from Madrid to here which takes about 50 minutes and that means that a lot of people from Madrid do consider coming to live in a place like this because it is way cheaper cheaper to live cost of living of course a lot cheaper than a big city like Madrid and if you don’t mind a 50-minute commute by fast train in the morning and a 50-minute commute back again you could live in a city like this easily now there’s no airport here so to catch flights you’d have to go to Madrid there was an airport they did build an airport here it was a very big infrastructure project here the Castilla-La Mancha Airport and the idea was that it was going to be a secondary airport to baracus in Madrid but financial problems didn’t really get off the ground and I’m not really sure what’s happened to it I think it’s owned by the Chinese or at least that’s what I read so I know commercial flights coming in or out at the moment but that could change in the future maybe I do not know so yeah you’d have to catch a train to Madrid and then a plane from there and because we are bang smack in the middle of Spain on the Meseta you’re going to get the typical weather hot summers and cold winters although today we’re at the end of October it’s going to be about 23 degrees today so not too bad from that point of view but winters here can be cold and summers can be hot and there’s also no river and the coast there’s a long way away however there are places where you can go into the countryside there is a wetlands here called the Tablas de Damiel don’t know whether you can swim though or not but there are places where you can find a bit of water and there is a water park here in theory out if you needed to cool off in summer and another thing I’ll say about the city is it seems to be really really safe last night in the centre we were near the cathedral walking around the platform a or the main square and there was a police presence there no police cars there were no police in the cars but you got the sensation that it is a safe city and this would be a great city to bring up kids I must say and because it’s a provincial capital you can get all of the services you need done in a place like this this is a government building behind me you’d have your social security officers here you’d have everything you needed to live well you probably wouldn’t have to go to other places to get things done hospitals here schools so from that point of view excellent Another name for that rial is it the Royal City or is it the real City well I think it’s the Royal City although that’s a bit ironic because there’s no Royals here there’s no royal palace there’s no king or queen living here of course all of that takes place in Madrid but it does have the name of theory al the Royal City I think because there was a king that decided to give it that name back in the day don’t know the exact history but I think that is the story they changed the name of the city back in the day but no Royals present here and of course Castilla-la mancha is famous for Manchego cheese which is one of Spain’s most famous varieties and you can find it everywhere you go this is also an area where there’s a lot of hunting going on so you’ll get a lot of products related to hunting for example pheasants and that type of stuff boar meat so those are the the main regional products it’s also a wine area and I’ll be honest the ones are not too bad and fewer rial is also a university city so for the months of the year when people are studying there is a bit of life in this city but apparently when the course is in the city does get a bit dead from a from a nightlife point of view and that let’s be honest there’s not a lot of places around I didn’t see a lot of places last night to get a drink but I’m sure there are a few here and the nightlife of course as in every city in Spain is better than a lot of other places in the world this is one of the reasons why a lot of people from Madrid decide to come to a place like this because you can get a flat in the center of the city for a row you know around a hundred thousand euros whereas in Madrid you’d be paying anywhere from 250 to 300 thousand euro for the same thing most likely but here as we can see for less than a hundred thousand you can pick up something flat in the center of the city there four bedrooms ninety-two thousand euros. no mas o menos tengo todo localizado el Cathedral aquí, La Plaza Mayor por ahí y luego hay una iglesia que se llama San Pedro que también es…Bonito? now behind me here we have the the Cathedral one of the main sights in this city and definitely worth a visit last night we had dinner in the very same plaza here next to the cathedral and in a city like Madrid you would expect to pay a lot of money but here it was not expensive I think two people we were able to have dinner and a few drinks for about 30 euros which is a good value for money so last night this place was full of outdoor seating it was a great night it was about 18 or 19 degrees were able to sit outside and have dinner that’s a definite pro for a city like this wasn’t crowded able to get a table really really easily and the food was not bad I recommended and the service wasn’t bad either so were quite good from that point of view and that’s one thing I will say that people in this part of the world the people that I’ve seen so far are extremely friendly haven’t had a problem to find anything everybody but has been more than helpful showing us around and telling us what to see so great from that point of view is that Man Quixote again okay now we’re coming into another of the must-sees here in theory l which is the the Plaza Mayor yard and not the most exciting platter my god I’ve seen although yesterday there were quite a few people sitting out on the terraces having a drink and something to eat but this time today quite quiet not one of the most beautiful ones that I’ve seen either in fact my mate yesterday said that this is one of the ugliest cities that he has seen here in Spain I wouldn’t go that far it’s not that bad but definitely not one of the most visually spectacular places in Spain I will say and as you can see here from the plateau my yard will have a look around all of these places that we have here behind me put chairs out there out door seating and these are all the typical restaurants in the area serving the typical fare and the local wines as well which as I mentioned are quite good somebody just shouting their Espania guy over here on the bench obviously had a big night last night and sleeping it off now unemployment in this part of the world is a bit of a problem I think Castilla-la Mancha the region has one of the highest youth unemployment in the European Union so the European Union puts a lot of money into training young people trying to get them into employment normal unemployment as well also quite high difficult to get a job a lot of people depended on the construction industry a few years ago and of course the hole that let that left was difficult to fill and tourism another one of the main industries and also the agriculture as I said before but I have noticed that there are a lot of English academies in the area so if you did decide to come and live in a city like this and you’re looking for that authentic Spain experience you could get a job teaching English reasonably easy I would think and the other private course is that you have Madrid less than 15 minutes away by a fast train so that’s always an option so work in a big city live in a smaller city and get that good quality of life with a Madrid salary and again we see the presence of el Quixote literally everywhere you go here you will see that name and his offsider Sancho Panza and check out this for a church why impressive but of course that is one thing that Spain is not short of massive churches and every city that you go to has one or two and of course they are realities we saw before also has a cathedral so that’s also something you can come and visit when you come to a city like this but that’s also something that I noticed last night is that there are very very few foreign tourists in this city I saw a couple of Japanese people walking around a couple of other people from Asia didn’t see the usual massification of tourism that you’ll see in other cities in Spain so that is a definite pro now this is one of the main areas where people come to eat and drink in theory all this Street over here was teeming with people last night all of these places behind me were also really really busy it being Saturday night of course and there were lots and lots of people sitting out on terraces enjoying the good weather that this city has to offer and the good food and with Quixote in the background I’ll start to wrap this video up so if you are looking for a small manageable city with high quality of life where you can live really really well close to Madrid well-connected to hours away by car 50 minutes away by fast train and your smack bang in the centre of castilla-la mancha this is the city for you I recommend it as a great city to live and if you’re looking for that quality of life aspect that you can’t get in bigger cities in Spain anymore safe what more do you need the food is good and the people are friendly questions or comments please leave them in the section below give the video a thumbs up if you liked it I’ll see you in the next video, hasta luego
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