route 12 Trail through the Cidade da Cultura and Alameda Park

Although the park receives the generic name of Alameda (“poplar grove”), it’s made up of three well differentiated parts: the Alameda boulevard, the carballeira (“oak grove”) of Santa Susana and the Ferradura (“horseshoe”) boulevard. The unit these three formed, is, since the XIX century, the biggest point of reference for walks and leisure for the people of Santiago, characterized for being a very welcoming place, somewhat of a natural lounge.
Its privileged location, on the edge of the historical city, and with an excellent perspective over its west façade – the more monumental –, transformed it into the main urban garden in the city, remarkable as well for the variety and bearing of its arboreal and ornamental species, such as the oaks, the eucalyptus trees or the pergola with a view formed by the horse chestnuts in the Ferradura boulevard.
The pass of time has left its footprints on its layout, as can be observed in the central avenue, with passages for the different social classes of the XIX century; in the almost triumphal arch that grants access to the Lions’ Promenade, or in the disposition of flower beds, fountains and ponds. And also in its nineteenth-century, modernist and current buildings – Santa Susana Chapel, Pilar Church, the dovecote, the bandstand, acoustic bench, etc. – in the abundance and forms of its statues and sculptures, and in its furniture, especially the granite benches with artistic foundry backs from the well-known Galician Sargadelos factory.