The ancient walled city of Girona - an hour and twenty minutes by bus or train from Barcelona - stands on a fortress-like hill, high above the River Onyar. It's been fought over in almost every century since it was the Roman fortress of Gerunda on the Via Augusta, and perhaps more than any other place in Catalunya, it retains the distinct flavour of its erstwhile inhabitants. 

Following the Moorish conquest of Spain, Girona was an Arab town for over two hundred years, a fact apparent in the maze of narrow streets in the centre, and there was also a continuous Jewish presence here for six hundred years. By the eighteenth century, Girona had been besieged on 21 occasions, and in the nineteenth century it earned itself the nickname "Immortal" by surviving five attacks, of which the longest was a seven-month assault by the French in 1809.