Ponferrada

The present castle is from 1440 so although it's named for the Knights Templar, that Order had been dissolved in 1312 after falling out with the King of France. By the 18th century the castle had lost its importance and was dilapidated, to the discomfort of occupying French troops during the Napoleonic wars. It was a ruin until reconstruction from 1924.

Built from 1573 in fits and starts over a century, this church was never the seat of a bishop but became a stop on the pilgrimage to Santiago. The effigy of the Virgen de La Encina was installed in 1908 - "Encina" means the oak from which it supposedly sprang fully-formed, like a cuckoo from a Swiss clock, when the Knights were chopping timber to build the Old Castle.

Exhibiting the region's prehistory and history.

History of radio and the journalist Luis del Olmo (b 1937), only in Spanish.

Small collection of locomotives and rolling stock, all static.

The story of Ponferrada's mining and industry, housed in a former power station.