Salamanca lies on a plateau by the Tormes River and is one of the most spectacular renaissance cities in Europe. Through the centuries, the sandstone buildings have gained an exquisite golden glow, thus the nickname “La Dorada”, the golden city. Salamanca is world famous for its university, one of the oldest in Europe, and is enormously popular with people all over the world who want to learn Spanish because its inhabitants speak Castilian- the “purest” Spanish in Spain.