The 1808 scars
Napoleon's shot craters to touch — history under your fingers.
Mister No — CC BY 3.0 · Felivet — Public domain · Sjaak Kempe from Groningen, The Netherlands — CC BY 2.0 · Photograph by Mike Peel (www.mikepeel.net). — CC BY-SA 4.0
The Quart Towers are Valencia's sterner western twins: the fifteenth-century gate of two massive cylinders on the Castile road — scars their identity: the outer face is pocked with Napoleon's 1808 cannonball craters, left deliberately as a resistance medal read by hand before eye. Centuries a nobles' prison, then a powder store — surviving the walls' demolition (1865) alone with their sister Serranos. Two euros climbs to a double terrace over the old quarter and its blue domes. They are the quieter twin: Serranos takes the fame and festivals, Quart keeps the scars and silence — and the complete wall pilgrimage joins them by a ten-minute walk through the old Carmen quarter.
Napoleon's shot craters to touch — history under your fingers.
Gothic military engineering after Naples' royal model.
Plaça de Santa Úrsula, 46003 Valencia
Museum of Prehistory of ValenciaA museum covering the history of the Valencia region from the Stone Age through 4 minutes walk4.7
Church of San NicolásA church in the old centre of Valencia known locally as the Valencian Sistine Ch5 minutes walk4.8
IVAM, Valencian Institute of Modern ArtValencia's museum of modern and contemporary art, opened in 1989 and among the f6 minutes walk4.3
Portal de la ValldignaA stone arch on Calle Caballeros, what remains of the gate that separated the Ch6 minutes walk4.4
Central MarketValencia's Central Market is near-inarguably Europe's most beautiful food market6 minutes walk4.8Serranos is grander, its view more famous, its ceremonial scene richer; Quart truer in scar and thinner in crowd. The practical answer: they are two stops of one walk — give both their shared hour.