El Toboso

El Toboso is a town and municipality located in the province of Toledo, Spain. According to the 2001 census, El Toboso has a total population of 2,069 inhabitants. The economy of the town is based on wine production and cattle, and sheep.

El Toboso is famous for appearing in the novel by the Spanish writer Miguel de Cervantes, Don Quixote, as the town in which the fictional character Dulcinea lives. She is not only fictional as a character in a novel, but also in Don Quixote's imagination - she is actually the farm girl Aldonza Lorenzo. The town also appears in Graham Greene's tribute "Monsignor Quixote", where the heroes are a priest (supposedly a descendant of Cervantes's character), and the recently deposed Communist mayor of the town in the post-Franco era.

The most important monuments and tourist places in the town are:
* The Catholic church of "San Antonio Abad", built in the 15th century.
* The convent of "Trinitarias Recoletas", from the 17th century.
* The Cervantine Museum.
* The Museum of Dulcinea
* The lake of "La Nava".

External links (in English)

* [http://www.casadelatorre.com/english/indexenglish.htm La Casa de la Torre] A 17th century manor converted into a charming hotel with a "Quixotic ambiance". Rooms devoted to Cervantes' works, with special protagonism to our hero Don Quixote and its literature.

External links (in Spanish)

* [http://www.eltoboso.org/ El Toboso, cuna de Dulcinea] , Town Hall of El Toboso.
* [http://www.aache.com/toboso/ El Toboso, la Casa de la Torre] , some interesting material.