San Marcos is the round church. Most Romanesque churches are long and rectangular, but this twelfth-century building in Salamanca has a circular plan, with a thick drum of stone and brick that looks more like a small fortress than a place of prayer. There are only a handful of such churches in Spain, and the shape has attracted speculation, with local tradition tying it to the military orders and the crusading era, though the truth is hard to prove. What is certain is that the building was put up in the days when the city's churches also served as places of refuge and defence, and the thick walls tell the story clearly.
It stands near the university quarter, and a visit gives you a pleasing contrast with the elaborate stone of the major monuments. The walls are made partly of brick in a decorative pattern, a style that connects Salamanca to the Mudéjar tradition of central Spain, where Muslim craftsmen continued to build in brick under Christian rulers. The inside is simple and dim. It is worth a few minutes if the door is open, but opening hours are unpredictable, so it can be a case of try and see.
The riding around Salamanca is a matter of long, straight roads, high plains and big weather. The countryside is a patchwork of cereal fields, fallow land and dehesa. In spring, the fields are green, with poppies at the edges, and in July they turn pale gold and the heat shimmers on the tarmac. In winter the plain can be foggy and icy, and the wind from the sierras to the south is sharp. Go south toward the Sierra de Francia for curves, or west toward the Arribes del Duero, the deep granite canyons on the Portuguese border, for more dramatic scenery.
The city has plenty of fuel stations, and the suburbs of Santa Marta de Tormes and Villamayor have supermarkets and workshops. A quick lunch can be found easily, with the classic dish being a plate of chickpea stew, followed by something sweet. The smell of the city after rain is of wet stone and earth, and the light in late afternoon is soft. Leave time to walk down to the river, where the old bridge gives a lovely view back at the towers.