Delights of Northern Spain and Portugal - Memorials to Sir John Moore and Corunna in Spain, and Gaudi buildings in Leon

We were planning a route around northern Spain from Santander, and Bilbao where we previously saw the Guggenhaim's Museum. I would have liked to go East to Barcelona and see the Gaudi's buildings, the cathedral and several more.

Going anti-clockwise, to the West, where can you visit?

 When I saw Coruna on a map of Spain I immediately remembered the poem about the burial of a British military man, although I could not remember his name and the Spanish and English spellings of the placenames are differrnet. 

Here is the poem which I ound in Wikisource.

Poems That Every Child Should Know edited by Mary E. Burt

The Burial of Sir John Moore at Corunna by Charles Wolfe

The Eve of Waterloo

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The Burial of Sir John Moore at Corunna.

"The Burial of Sir John Moore" was one of my reading-lessons when I was a child. A distinguished teacher says: "It has become a part of popular education, as has also "The Eve of Waterloo" and "The Death of Napoleon." They are all poems of great rhythmical swing, intense and graphic. (1791-1823.)

Not a drum was heard, not a funeral note,
⁠As his corse to the rampart we hurried;
Not a soldier discharged his farewell shot
⁠O'er the grave where our hero we buried.

We buried him darkly at dead of night,
⁠The sods with our bayonets turning;
By the struggling moonbeam's misty light,
⁠And the lantern dimly burning.

No useless coffin enclosed his breast,
⁠Not in sheet nor in shroud we wound him;
But he lay like a warrior taking his rest,
⁠With his martial cloak around him.

Few and short were the prayers we said,
⁠And we spoke not a word of sorrow;
But we steadfastly gazed on the face that was dead
⁠And we bitterly thought of the morrow.

We thought, as we hollow'd his narrow bed,
⁠And smoothed down his lonely pillow.
That the foe and the stranger would tread o'er his head,
⁠And we far away on the billow!

Lightly they'll talk of the spirit that's gone,
⁠And o'er his cold ashes upbraid him,—
But little he'll reck, if they let him sleep on
⁠In the grave where a Briton has laid him.

But half of our heavy task was done
⁠When the clock struck the hour for retiring;
And we heard the distant and random gun
⁠That the foe was sullenly firing.

Slowly and sadly we laid him down,
⁠From the field of his fame fresh and gory;
We carved not a line, and we raised not a stone—
⁠But we left him alone with his glory!

C. Wolfe.

When I looked at the Wikitravel and Tripadvisor listings I saw no mention of the famous man.  However, back to Wikipedia and the life story of the man, I managed to track down two memorials to him in Spain and another in the UK.

Sir John Moore statue in Glasgow, Scotland, UK.

In Hastings, England, there is a blue plaque on the site where Moore was billeted

 

His tomb in San Carlos Garden Corunna, Spain.

The tomb is in the centre raised in the air, above the two sets of protective iron railings.

 

Let's start with where is Corunna. 

From her going east across Spain you come to the city of Leon. it has a cathedral and Casa botines by Gaudi.

Another Gaudi building is in nearby Astorgia.

Where could we stay? We were looking at paradoes in Spain and Pousadas in Portugal.

Useful Websites

https://en.wikivoyage.org/wiki/Le%C3%B3n_(Spain)#/media/File:Catedral_G%C3%B3tica_de_Le%C3%B3n.jpg

https://www.portugalpousadas.com/Pousadas-of-Portugal.htm

https://www.poetrybyheart.org.uk/poems/the-burial-of-sir-john-moore-after-corunna

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