24 Hours In: Almeria

Open your eyes to the city

09.00: Wake up at Hotel Torreluz (00 34 950 234 399; torreluz.com), which offers two to four-star accommodation in three buildings around the pretty Plaza Flores, a great location from which to set off on a city tour in any direction. Double rooms start at €63 (£45) a night.

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Set out for a local breakfast

09.30: Forgo the hotel breakfast offering and instead enjoy a proper Andalucian desayuno of café con leche and a cheese and ham tostada at the characterful Café Amalia housed in a chrome kiosk with terrace seating on the Puerta de Purchena.

Take stock at the food market

10.00: Check out the daily covered food market on the Aguilar de Campo, where the neat piles of Mediterranean vegetables, glistening fresh fish, huge cured hams and slabs of succulent meat will make you despair of Britain's supermarket culture.

Soak up some Moorish history

11.00: Walk up the hill to the dusty and distinctly North-African looking streets to the west of the city and tour the Alcazaba fortress (00 34 950 271 617; junta-andalucia.es/culture) with its gardens and archaeological remains which chart five centuries of Moorish life in Spain.

Try a taste of North Africa

13.00: Continue the North African theme and enjoy a delicious chicken tagine with olives and almonds or a bowl of couscous at Teteria Almedina, Calle Paz 2, (00 34 629 277 827, restauranteteteriaalmedina.com) where you can sit on cushions at low tables as if you were in Morocco.

Wind your way to the cathedral

14.30: Walk back down to the city centre through the narrow streets and pay a visit to the heavily fortified cathedral (00 34 650 231 926), built in the 16th century to withstand attacks from North Africa. The inside is simply decorated, with fine Gothic vaulting and a painting of the Virgin by Murillo. The streets between here and the Paseo de Almeria are good for shopping for clothes, homewares and local food and wine.

Take afternoon tea in style

15.30: Break your shopping trip for afternoon tea at the elegant café La Dulce Alianza, Paseo de Almeria 6, where meringues and other sugary treats are piled up in pretty displays in the windows.

Brush up on the Bronze Age

16.30: An important collection of discoveries from the Bronze Age settlement of Los Millares, 17km north-west of Almeria, is on display in the newly opened Museo de Almeria, Carretera de Ronda 91 (00 34 950 649 800; juntadeandalucia.es/ cultura/museos/MAL). You can look at cooking utensils, jewellery, weapons and a recreation of a Bronze Age burial chamber.

Splash around before supper

18.00: Almeria has an urban beach strung out along the Mediterranean to the east of the city centre. The sea is blue and inviting and clean enough for a good splash before you return to the hotel to get ready for the evening.

Feast on tapas and sangria

20.00: After a glass of sangria at a pavement café, bypass the formal restaurants and instead head for supper at Casa Puga, Calle Jovellanos 7 (00 34 950 231 530), Almeria's most atmospheric tapas bar. You can sit at a table in the dining room of this lovely tiled bar and be served a range of local specialities including stuffed pimientos, fried calamari and grilled red prawns, before finishing off with a plate of Manchego cheese and a glass or two of fruity sweet sherry.

Chat over a late-night coffee

23.00: End the evening with a carajillo, a black coffee laced with brandy or whisky, on the grand street-side terrace of Molly Malone, Paseo de Almeria 56, a bar which - despite its name - is a lively and enjoyable local favourite.