Paseo Bajo de la Virgen del Puerto

The Paseo Bajo de la Virgen del Puerto runs along the left bank of the Manzanares, at the foot of the slope that separates the Campo del Moro from the meadow. Its name comes from a step in the terrain: when Charles III ordered the road’s level raised, the stretch by the river was left below and the one above became the Paseo Alto. In 1780 Juan Durán built a double stairway that stitched the two levels together and led to the chapel. The site had a past. The Habsburgs called it Campo de la Tela and held mounted tournaments there. The chapel that lends the name was designed by Pedro de Ribera between 1716 and 1718, one of his first Madrid works, already showing the Churrigueresque baroque that would mark his career. Each September the Verbena de la Melonera was born here, when melon sellers pitched their stalls by the chapel to spare themselves the tolls at the San Vicente gate. For centuries this bank belonged to the washerwomen of the Manzanares, who spread their laundry on the sand. The trade faded around 1926, when the river was channelled. The Civil War left the chapel in ruins in 1936; rebuilt, its restoration was finished in 1951.