Cáceres in Cáceres
The province of Cáceres is Spain’s second most extensive province, surpassed only by the other province together with which it constitutes the autonomic region of Extremadura, Badajoz. Cáceres covers a total of 19,868 km2, and it is the Spanish province with the largest area of forest: 9,440 km2, almost half its total area.
The province is divided in two from east to west by the river Tagus, and it is traversed by several mountain ranges.The highest point in Cáceres is Pico de Calvitero at 2,399m.
Cáceres lies to the north of Badajoz, and apart from bordering this province it also borders Toledo in Castilla-La Mancha, Avila and Salamanca in Castilla y Leon and, to the west, Portugal.
The province has 400,036 inhabitants (2017), 95,917 of which live in its capital of the same name.
Up through the centuries, Cáceres’s economy was mainly based on agriculture and livestock, and although the city has since become an important administrative centre with services such as tourism and construction being the cornerstones of the economy, times gone past have put their definite mark on the traditional gastronomy, which is firmly based on meat, especially lamb.
The weather shows dramatic changes between summer and winter, with January temperatures usually being below 10°C with the occasional frost and snow, and the average temperature in July lying at 33°C and often going above 40°C.
The sun shines for 2,891 hours a year, with the maximum in July, 370 hours (half the hours of the month), and the minimum in January, 123 hours. The average rainfall is 523 mm a year, the majority of which falls in December (87 mm) and the minimum in July (7 mm).
On the culture front, May is the most important month of the year, as this is the month when Cáceres hosts the international WOMAD festival (World of Music, Art and Dance) every year, and the city’s own fiesta, Feria de Mayo, which Alfonso IX of Leon launched in 1896.
On these two occasions the city is a hubbub of people from all over Spain and the rest of the world, who come to take part in these great events celebrated in an amazing setting.
