The black 'Crow Castle', the oldest surviving keep in Japan, at the gateway to the Northern Alps.
The capital of Wallonia under one of the largest citadels in Europe, where the Sambre meets the Meuse.
A Crusader sea castle, a soap museum in an old khan and the vaulted souks of a Phoenician port.
A round fort of 1668, the Friday goat market and the date-palm oasis at the foot of Jebel Akhdar.
The Hunza valley capital under Rakaposhi, the Baltit fort and apricot orchards on the Karakoram Highway.
A Kremlin on the bluff where the Oka meets the Volga, and the longest cable car across a river in Europe.
The blue city under the Mehrangarh fort, the biggest and most dramatic in Rajasthan.
The dzong at the meeting of two rivers, the old winter capital, with jacaranda in spring.
The Hwaseong fortress walls to walk in a loop, and the fried chicken street below them.
A golden sandstone fort still lived in, and camel safaris into the Thar desert dunes.
Santa Barbara castle above Postiguet beach and the palm-lined Explanada, the Costa Blanca capital.
The town of a thousand windows: Ottoman houses stacked up a hillside below a still-inhabited castle.
A castle on a rock above the Vah with a Roman inscription from AD 179 carved into the cliff.
The Castle of St Peter built from the Mausoleum's stones, wooden gulet cruises and the Aegean nightlife.
The cherry-blossom capital of Transcarpathia, a castle and Europeโs longest linden alley along the Uzh.
A medieval fortress on a rock in a canyon of the Smotrych river, the most dramatic castle in Ukraine.
Two castles face each other across the river โ Estonian Hermann and Russian Ivangorod โ on the EU border.
A town of stairs, a Mimosa festival in February and three fortresses at the mouth of the Bay of Kotor.
'Here Portugal was born': the castle of the first king and a UNESCO medieval centre.
Slovenia's oldest town, a Roman settlement with a castle and the shaggy Kurent masks of carnival.
The first capital of modern Greece: Venetian fortresses, a Bourtzi island castle and neoclassical lanes.
Ali Pasha's lakeside castle, a monastery island and silversmiths, at the foot of the Pindus mountains.
A 17-metre waterfall in the middle of town, a fortress and the last Bosnian royal capital.
A church on an island in an alpine lake, a castle on the cliff and cream cake on the shore.
The Cathedral of St James built entirely of stone, four fortresses and the boat to Krka waterfalls.
A Roman aqueduct of 167 arches without mortar and the fairy-tale Alcazar that inspired Disney.
A Livonian Order castle, a cobbled old town and Gauja National Park for canoeing and bobsleigh.
Rozafa castle above the largest lake in the Balkans, the bicycle city and the gateway to the Albanian Alps.
A red-brick island castle in Lake Galve and the kibinai pastries of the Karaim community.
A castle on a crag above the battlefields of Wallace and Bruce โ Scotland's history in one town.
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