We have time for a day trip from Madrid to either Toledo or to Cuenca. Which is more beautiful and fun?

What are your interest. They are completely different destinations, but both are great destinations for lunch.

Never been to Cuenca or even heard of it actually but IME nothing can top Toledo, to me one of the most interesting and old-world looking cities in Europe.

Toledo, Toledo, Toledo. One of the most magnificent cities in Spain and I easily could have spent the night.

Toledo! I spent three nights there and could have easily spent an additional night or two.

I wanted to do a day trip from Madrid to Cuenca but found too much to see in Madrid to spare the day.

The Toledo Cathedral is one of the most beautiful and interesting I've seen and seems more impressive with each visit.

Cuenca is the capital of the province of Cuenca in Castile-La Mancha, known for it's hanging houses and is on the World Heritage list of historic cities (http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/781).

http://www.cuenca.es

Toledo is also a World Heritage Site. It is certainly beautiful. I don't know about "fun." I enjoyed the atmosphere, history, architecture and culture but it was pretty quiet.

Hands down, it's Cuenca

To complicate your choice, Toledo really deserves 2 full days IMHO. So if you expect to be back in the area some time, and only have time for a day trip this time, it might make sense to see Cuenca and defer Toledo until you have more time for it. Just something to consider....

To complicate your choices even more, Cuenca deserves at least an overnight stay. It's a different type of tourist sight, but still very interesting in its long history. We only had time to see the cathedral and museum, but you could easily spend a few days exploring this important ancient city (http://turismo.cuenca.es).

For those ignorant on the aspects of Cuenca, you can check out the 7 routes when visiting the city, Rutas por la Ciudad: http://turismo.cuenca.es/portal/lang...0/default.aspx

Cuenca is a much underappreciated cultural adventure.

Loved Cuenca, Toledo not so much.

HappyTrvlr: Could you say what you base your opinions on? I'm just about to book a hotel for Toledo and hadn't thought of going to Cuenca, so I'd appreciate your "contrarian" opinion--everybody on the forum says Toledo is a must see.

My choice would be Toledo but Cuenca is very unusual and uncrowded. The Enchanted City is just northeast of Cuenca, very interesting rock formations.

https://www.google.com/search?q=cuen...=1600&bih=1075

Cuenca does indeed look sweet - will put it in my bucket list. Thanks Robert especially for highlighting it.

Cuenca was a wonderful surprise ! I took the bus-just about an hour- to Cuenca and then another short bus to the historic center-a very steep walk up!The bus is just across the street from the bus station.I don't understand why more people don't visit it,it's amazing.The streets are very narrow with lots of steps, so be careful, slippery.The hanging houses are stunning.Make the effort to walk across the bridge to take a look at the Parador, a former convent, usually fully booked.Fabulous photos from there.There are loads of places to eat and lots of art galleries.The cathedral was a total surprise,very impressive. The bus back to town stops in front of the cathedral.The tourist office has probably the friendliest staff-they gave me a super poster of Cuenca!
I ended up staying the night at :
http://www.posadasanjose.com/

Thank you so much for your help!! I'm thinking that maybe I'll reconfigure our itinerary so that maybe we can see both.

We found ourselves in Cuenca on good Friday a few years ago. The prosession through the town and up the hill to the cathedral was haunting. The people carrying life size replicas of the stations of the cross wearing purple robes with musicians playing behind them was incredible. We hadn't planned on that. We just stopped by to see the town and the hanging houses and forgot that it was goof Friday.

Raoul_Duke:

I take it you had a problem with Madrid.