In the year 25 BC the Romans founded a colony here for veterans of their wars in Hispania, named it Emerita Augusta, and made it the capital of the province of Lusitania. Two thousand years later, Mérida has more Roman remains than anywhere else in Spain, and they are not roped off in a museum. They are in the streets. A long Roman bridge, around eight hundred metres, still crosses the broad Guadiana on dozens of arches and is walked daily by locals. A theatre and an amphitheatre sit side by side near the centre, and in summer actors perform classical plays in the theatre in the open air. On the edge of town the tall brick piers of an aqueduct, called Los Milagros, the miracles, march across a field.
In the old centre there is also a Roman temple, dedicated to Diana, built into the corner of a later palace, and a well-designed national museum of Roman art with brick arches by the architect Rafael Moneo. All of it is within walking distance. If you ride in from the south, the first sign of the city is often the bridge, and it is worth a slow ride along the river for the view.
The surrounding country is the dry, open dehesa of Extremadura, a landscape of scattered holm oaks and cork oaks under which black Iberian pigs forage for acorns, and which produces some of the best ham in the world. Summers here are famously hot, with temperatures that can exceed forty degrees, so start early and expect a long, siesta-length lunch break. Spring is the best season, when the grass is green and the storks are nesting on every tower and electricity pylon.
As a start for the ride north along the old silver route, the city is practical. It has around fifty-six thousand inhabitants, and fuel stations on all the main roads, and the Ruta de la Plata itself passes on a modern highway, so you can choose between the fast road and the quiet old ones. Breakfast in the central square, among the orange trees, is a good habit, and the coffee is strong.