Every Roman town had a forum, the place where trade, politics and religion tangled together, and Mérida's municipal forum sits right at the heart of the old centre. The remains are patchy, a platform of paving stones, a few columns and some fragments of a colonnade, but it is easy to read as a rectangle of open space once you know what you are looking at. This was where the city's councillors met, where merchants did deals and where local priests carried out the ceremonies that bound the colony to Rome.
The most striking building next to it is the Temple of Diana, a granite temple that was in fact dedicated to the cult of the emperor and not to the goddess at all. Its tall columns survived because a sixteenth-century nobleman built his palace around them, and the odd marriage of Roman stone and Renaissance rooms is still visible. Close by, the Casa del Mitreo and the Roman roads running outward give a sense of how big the city really was. By the second century it may have had well over twenty thousand inhabitants, and it was a capital in the true sense, with governors, soldiers and a huge supply of public water.
The town today is relaxed and walkable. For bikes, it is best to park outside the pedestrian core, in a garage near the river or on the main avenue, and wander in. Mérida has about fifty-six thousand people and every kind of service, so fuel and food are simple. Cafés around the Plaza de España fill by mid-morning, and the Extremaduran habit of serving something with every drink is generous to a hungry rider. The ride goes toward the Guadalupe hills, which means long, empty roads and then twists. Check the weather for the day, since cloudless skies in July can mean forty degrees by two o'clock.
Linger if you can. The forum is a good place to sit in the shade and imagine the clamour of a Roman market day, with oil, wine and grain changing hands. Before you leave, fill the water bottle and top up the tank, because the roads beyond the town are quiet and the towns are small.