{"id":6753,"date":"2017-03-11T16:55:16","date_gmt":"2017-03-11T21:55:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.explorica.com\/blog\/?p=6753"},"modified":"2017-03-14T11:58:34","modified_gmt":"2017-03-14T15:58:34","slug":"lesson-plan-avila","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.explorica.com\/blog\/lesson-plan-avila","title":{"rendered":"Lesson plan: The walls of Avila"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The town of Avila, Spain (located just west of Madrid), has the best preserved medieval walls in the country and is the second biggest wall in the world after the Great Wall of China. These ancient walls were built as a defensive mechanism\u00a0but also served to control the entrances (of both people and goods) to the city and guard against outbreaks of the plague. The walls are shaped in a sort of rectangle\u00a0and feature 88 towers and 9 gates. The most spectacular gate is Puerta del Alcazar, the Gate of the Fortress. It&#8217;s not surprising why Avila, and its walls, is a UNESCO World Heritage site.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-6819 alignright\" src=\"http:\/\/www.explorica.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/02\/puerta_san_vicente_avila_t0500575.jpg_1306973099.jpg\" alt=\"puerta_san_vicente_avila_t0500575.jpg_1306973099\" width=\"327\" height=\"181\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.explorica.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/02\/puerta_san_vicente_avila_t0500575.jpg_1306973099.jpg 660w, https:\/\/www.explorica.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/02\/puerta_san_vicente_avila_t0500575.jpg_1306973099-300x166.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 327px) 100vw, 327px\" \/>The walls took almost 600 years to build, starting in 1090, and are nearly 40 feet high. Today, visitors can walk along the tops of some of the walls, just as people did hundreds of years ago (although you pay an entrance fee of a few euros now \u2013 I\u2019m not sure if people paid back then). And, the walls are beautifully illuminated at night.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Read about the<a href=\"https:\/\/www.ucavila.es\/aulce\/index.php?option=com_content&amp;view=article&amp;id=4&amp;Itemid=5&amp;lang=en\" target=\"_blank\"> history, structure, and architects<\/a> of the wall. Note the last paragraph, which focuses on how the citizens of the town were included in the obligations of tending and guarding the walls. Can you think of other places in the world where people feel so connected to an aspect of their town? Or do you think this is a rare instance of a structure building, as it were, a community?<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/youtu.be\/OGp5-fDH-GM\" target=\"_blank\">Watch this video<\/a> of the walls of Avila, and then take a walk yourself, along the wall,\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/muralladeavila.com\/en\/plan-your-visit\/route-around-the-walls\" target=\"_blank\">here<\/a>. Click, if you like, on the 360-degree section of that site for closer looks. Note some of the details in the carvings and stone. What are some of the ways that the town has incorporated the walls into buildings \u2013 and daily life?<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/notesplusultra.com\/2010\/11\/10\/avila-spain\/\" target=\"_blank\">Read one traveler\u2019s<\/a> experiences in Avila, including walking along the walls. How do you think walls impact a city, long-term? What do they keep in \u2013 and keep out?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.explorica.com\/contact-us.aspx\" target=\"_blank\"><strong>Contact Explorica<\/strong><\/a> to start planning your next educational travel experience in <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.explorica.com\/teachers\/select-a-tour\/spain-and-portugal.aspx\" target=\"_blank\">Spain<\/a><\/strong>! 1.888.310.7120.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The town of Avila, Spain (located just west of Madrid), has the best preserved medieval walls in the country and is the second biggest wall in the world after the Great Wall of China. These ancient walls were built as a defensive mechanism\u00a0but also served to control the entrances (of both people and goods) to <a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.explorica.com\/blog\/lesson-plan-avila\">Read More &#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6818,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1,172],"tags":[310191],"class_list":["post-6753","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-explorica-news","category-teachers","tag-lesson-plan"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.explorica.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6753","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.explorica.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.explorica.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.explorica.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.explorica.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6753"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.explorica.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6753\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6828,"href":"https:\/\/www.explorica.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6753\/revisions\/6828"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.explorica.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6818"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.explorica.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6753"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.explorica.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6753"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.explorica.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6753"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}