The capital and port, Santa Cruz de La Palma is a charming town with beautiful streets, squares and steeply inclined alley ways and offers visitors a lively ambience with its friendly people. It sits on the edge of a volcanic crater which gives the town the form of an amphitheatre. The picturesque Real Street which is the centre of commercial and social life leads you to Espana Square where two fine examples of 16th century buildings are to be found, the Church of Iglesia del Salvador and the Town Hall. Santa Cruz de La Palma also has an excellent Museum of National History with wonderful zoological examples and traces of the original population as well as a large library.