The Sydney Morning Herald

Prominent columnists and journalists who write for The Sydney Morning Herald include Robert Manne, Doug Anderson, Paul Sheehan, Anthony Dennis, Mark Riley, Miranda Devine, Adele Horin, Michael Idato, Julia Baird, Mike Carlton, Gerard Henderson, Alan Ramsey, Peter FitzSimons, David Marr, Roy Masters, Keith Austin, Deborah Smith, Maggie Alderson and Richard Glover. Gaspar Melchor de Jovellanos, philosopher, politician, Enlightenment thinker. It also owns various other newspapers and magazines throughout Australia and New Zealand, including The Age (a similar broadsheet newspaper published in Melbourne). Severo Ochoa, 1959 Nobel Prize winner for Medicine. The company also owns the The Sun-Herald, the Sunday counterpart to the Herald, and a number of community newspapers in Sydney. Letizia, Princess of Asturias, a native of Oviedo and wife of Felipe, Prince of Asturias. It is currently controlled by John Fairfax Holdings. Fernando Alonso, Formula 1 racing driver, 2005 World Champion.

The Fairfax family owned the newspaper for 149 years but lost control of it on December 11, 1990 following financial misadventure of Warwick Fairfax. Leopoldo Alas, 19th century author of La Regenta, a seminal work in the Spanish literary canon. We have no wish to mislead; no interest to gratify by unsparing abuse or indiscriminate approbation.". There are also services to Barcelona, Salamanca, León, Valladolid, La Coruña, Bilbao, Seville, San Sebastián, Paris, Brussels or Nice, to name just a few. Its editorial policies were based "upon principles of candour, honesty and honour. It links Avilés, Gijón, Oviedo and Mieres with Madrid, several times a day. It became a daily newspaper in 1840, and in 1842 changed its name to The Sydney Morning Herald. There is also a bus service within and without the region, run by the ALSA company.

A decade later it was bought by Charles Kemp and John Fairfax. FEVE rail company links also the center of the region with Eastern and Western Asturias. The paper was named after Scotland's Glasgow Herald, and was founded by three Englishmen, Alfred Stephens, Frederick Stokes and William McGarvie. Major stops are the regional capital, Oviedo, and the main coastal city, Gijón. It only had four pages and a circulation of 750 copies. Spain's national RENFE rail network also serves Asturias well; trains regularly depart to and from the Spanish interior. The Sydney Morning Herald began its life as a weekly newspaper, the Sydney Herald. Eastern Asturias is now quite easily reached from Santander.

Since the advent of the Internet, the Herald has developed an comprehensive online presence with all major news stories available for online viewing and retained online for some time. Internal Spanish carriers such as Iberia and Spanair also serve Asturias, direct from Madrid and Barcelona, Brussels, London, Paris, Seville and others. Tabloid newspapers, such as its competitor The Daily Telegraph, are considerably smaller, with each page having a size of approximately A3. A UK-based international carrier, Easyjet, began daily flights to the airport in March 2005. The Herald is a broadsheet, meaning that each page is approximately A2 in size. Asturias is served by Ranon Airport (OVD), which is about an hour's road journey from Oviedo, near the northwest coast and the industrial town of Avilés. Column 8 is another long-running institution. These subsidies are lately in doubt, given the expansion of the Union in 2004 to include the poorer states of the former Communist bloc.

The cryptic crossword in the Sydney Morning Herald is popular. Asturias has benefited extensively since 1986 from European Union investment in roads and other essential infrastructure, though there has also been some controversy regarding how these funds are spent, for example, on miners' pensions. It also produces two colour magazines, the weekly Good Weekend, and the monthly the(sydney)magazine. Large out-of-town retail parks have opened near the region's largest cities (Gijón and Oviedo), whilst the ever-present Spanish construction industry appears to continue to thrive. They currently include a motoring section, Drive, a food and lifestyle section, Good Living, a property section, Domain, and a television section, The Guide. Regional economic growth is below the broader Spanish rate, though in recent years growth in service industries has helped reduce Asturias's high rate of unemployment. The Sydney Morning Herald publishes a number of daily sections, as large-format magazines, some of which have been part of the newspaper's infrastructure for more than two decades. The steel industry is now in decline, as is mining, as a result of competition from Eastern Europe, high costs of production, and declines in global steel demand.

Like The Age, the demographics of its readers are more attractive to many advertisers than its tabloid competitor. The industry created many jobs which resulted in significant migration from other provinces in Spain, mainly Extremadura, Andalucía and Castilla y León. In the coverage of Fairfax's business affairs, this revenue has often been referred to as "rivers of gold". The then state-owned ENSIDESA company is now part of the privatised ARCELOR Group. The Saturday edition of the Herald carries a massive classified section - a popular selling point and a powerful source of cash revenue for the company. The main regional industry, though, is steel: in the times of Francisco Franco´s dictatorship, it was one of the most powerful in the world. The Herald sells 375,000 copies to the Telegraph's 345,000. Production of milk and its derivatives has also been traditionally strong, with products from the Central Lechera Asturiana being exported all over Spain.

The Saturday editions of both papers are more closely matched. For many centuries the backbone of the Asturian economy was coal mining, steel production and fishing. Its circulation is smaller than the Telegraph; according to circulation data published in the first half of 2004, the Herald sells about 221,000 copies per weekday compared to around 409,000 copies of the Telegraph. Asturian cheeses, especially Cabrales, are also famous throughout Spain and beyond; Asturias is often called "the land of cheeses" (el pais de los quesos) due to the product's diversity and quality in this region. The Fairfax papers (the Sydney Morning Herald and The Age), seen as centrist, are often contrasted with the News Limited papers (The Australian, The Daily Telegraph and the Herald Sun), which tend to be more right-leaning, and "the Fairfax press" is often used pejoratively by conservative commentators. Apple groves foster the production of the traditional alcoholic drink, a natural cider (sidra). Historically the paper was characterised as a right of centre, old-school conservative organ of the Establishment, providing a counter-point within Fairfax's holdings to the liberal Melbourne Age, especially during David Syme's tenure as editor of the latter, and it did not editorialise in favour of Labor at a state election until 2003. The most famous regional dish is Fabada Asturiana, a rich stew made with large white beans (fabes), shoulder of pork (lacón), black sausage (morcilla), spicy sausage (chorizo) and saffron (azafrán).

The Herald attempts to maintain editorial balance, with both left leaning contributors like David Marr and cartoonist Michael Leunig, and conservative writers such as Miranda Devine and Gerard Henderson. Asturias is especially known for its seafood. It is often seen as the paper of the educated middle class. VIRTUAL TOURS (with over 450 photographs) http://www.asturiasenimagenes.com/. The Sydney Morning Herald is recorded as being read by a stronger representation of the so-called, "AB demographic", (the highest demographic in terms of education, income and occupation) than its main competitor, the only other major daily newspaper in Sydney, the Murdoch-owned The Daily Telegraph. Best viewed at low tide. . The unusual rock formation on the beach at Buelna village: east of Llanes.

Since then, over 51,000 editions have been produced. The coastal way (senda costera) between Pendueles and Llanes: This partly-paved nature route takes in some of Asturias' most spectacular coastal scenery, such as the noisy bufones (large water spouts created naturally by the erosion of the sea) and the Playa de Ballota. It is also the oldest Australian newspaper, having been continuously published since 1831. La Mesa (The Table): an unusually-shaped peak above the village of Tuiza de Arriba, high in the Ubiñas mountain range south of Oviedo. The Sydney Morning Herald is a major Australian broadsheet newspaper published daily in Australia's oldest and most populous city, Sydney. The Dobra River: south of Cangas de Onís, famous for its unusual colour and natural beauty. Of particular interest in this exemplary settlement are the traditional horreo grain silos, raised on stilts so as to keep field mice from getting at the grain.

Ceceda village: east of Oviedo along the N634 road. Other places of interest are.... The Asturian coast: especially the beaches in and around the summer resort of Llanes, and the Playa del Silencio near Cudillero fishing village. The Reconquista and eventual unification of all Spain is therefore said to have started in this very location.

The shrine to the Virgin Mary of Covadonga and the mountain lakes (los lagos), near Cangas de Onís: Legend has it that in the 8th century, the Virgin blessed Asturian Christian forces with a well-timed signal to attack Spain's Moorish conquerors, thereby taking the invaders by surprise. Weather permitting, it can be viewed clearly from Camarmeña village, near Las Arenas de Cabrales. The Picos de Europa National park, and other parts of the Asturian mountain range: The most famous peak in the park is the Picu Urriellu, also known as Naranjo de Bulnes (2519 m), a molar-shaped mountain which glows orange in the evening sun, hence its name. Santa María del Naranco and San Miguel de Lillo, a prerromanic church and a prerromanic castle build by the first Asturian kings are held in the Naranco mountain.

Oviedo, the capital city of Asturias: Nowadays is a cosmopolite city where art, culture and tradition are found in the town center. Major attractions include.... Annual rainfall is above 900 mm in all the region (Gijón-Xixón, 971 mm), increasing as we move from the coast to the interior, and reaching its peak in Picos de Europa ( Amieva, 1800 mm). Both rain and sunshine are regular weather features of Asturian winters.

The cold is especially felt in the mountains, where snow is present from November till May. Winters are fairly mild but with some very cold snaps. Summers are generally humid and warm, with considerable sunshine, but also some rain. The climate of Asturias, as with the rest of northwest Spain, is more varied than that of southern parts of the country.

Most of Asturias' beaches are sandy, clean and bordered by steep cliffs, on top of which it is not unusual to see grazing livestock. Notable examples include the Playa del Silencio (Beach of Silence) near the fishing village of Cudillero (west of Gijón), as well as the many beaches surrounding the summer resort of Llanes, such as the Barro, Ballota and Torimbia (the latter a predominantly nudist beach). The Asturian coastline is extensive, with hundreds of beaches, coves and natural sea caves. Perhaps surprisingly, climate change appears to have benefited the ski stations in recent times: relatively heavy snowfalls sustained the stations in the winters of 2003/2004 and 2004/2005.

In this era of climate change snow fall is unpredictable, but the skiing season generally runs from December to April inclusive. Asturias has two impressive ski stations, San Isidro and Pajares, both of which are easily accessed by road from the capital, Oviedo. The Cantabrian mountains offer opportunities for activities such as climbing, walking, skiing and caving, and extend some 200 kilometres in total, as far as Galicia province to the west of Asturias, and Cantabria province to the east. Other notable features of this predominantly-limestone range are the Parque Natural de Redes in the central east, the central Ubiñas south of Oviedo, and the Parque Natural de Somiedo in the west.

The Picos de Europa National Park forms the eastern range and contains the highest and arguably most spectacular mountains, rising to 2648 metres at the Torrecerredo peak. The Cantabrian mountain range (Cordillera Cantábrica) is Asturias' natural border with León province to the south. The key features of Asturian geography are its rugged cliffy coast and its mountainous interior. Since 1999 the President of the Government of Asturias has been Vicente Álvarez Areces, of the Spanish Socialist Worker's Party (PSOE).

The Asturian regional government holds comprehensive competencies in important areas such as health, education and protection of the environment. In 1982 Asturias became an Autonomous Community within the decentralized territorial structure established by the Constitution of 1978. The province's name was restored fully after the return of democracy to Spain, in 1977. With Franco eventually gaining control of all Spain, Asturias - traditionally linked to the Spanish crown - was known merely as the 'Province of Oviedo' from 1936 until Franco's death in 1975.

As a result, Asturias remained loyal to the democratic republican government during the war, and was the scene of an extraordinary defence in extreme terrain, the Battle of El Mazuco. Troops under the command of Francisco Franco were brought from the North African colonies to put down the rebellion and a ferocious oppression followed. In 1934, the left-wing workers' movement fought the right-wing government of the Second Spanish Republic in the so-called 'Revolution of Asturias'. Like all Spain, Asturias played its part in the events that led up to and include the Spanish Civil War.

The heritage of these wealthy families can still be seen in Asturias today: many large 'modernista' villas are dotted across the region, as well as cultural institutions such as free schools and public libraries. These entrepreneurs were known collectively as 'Indianos', for having visited and made their fortunes in the West Indies and beyond. At the same time there was significant migration to the Americas; those who succeeded overseas often returned to their native land much wealthier. The Industrial Revolution came to Asturias with the discovery and systematic exploitation of coal and iron resources.

Gaspar Melchor de Jovellanos, a polimath and prominent reformer and politician of the late 18th century, was born in the seaside town of Gijón (Xixón in the Asturian language). The renowned thinker Benito de Feijoo settled in the Benedictine Monastery of San Vicente, Oviedo. During the 18th Century, Asturias was one of the centres of the Spanish Enlightenment. After the fading of the 'Regnum Astorum' (Kingdom of Asturias), this historic land survived as a marginal territory in the north of Spain, although it provided the Spanish court with high-ranking aristocrats and played an important role in the colonisation of the Americas.

For this reason since the 14th century the heir to the Spanish throne automatically takes the title Prince of Asturias, much as the heir to the British throne is the Prince of Wales and Duke of Cornwall. Due to its situation and difficult terrain, the territories along the north coast of Spain were never part of Islamic Spain; the north served as the nucleus of a small Christian enclave, the Kingdom of Asturias, which was linked to Spain's visigoth kingdom. . Asturias is bordered to the east by Cantabria, to the south by Castilla y León, to the west by Galicia, and to the north by the Cantabrian Sea.

See also List of municipalities in Asturias, Comarcas of Asturias.. Other towns include Mieres, Langreo, Pola de Siero, Cangas de Onís, Cangas del Narcea, Grado, Pola de Lena, Pola de Laviana, El Entrego, Villaviciosa, and Llanes. The capital is Oviedo, and other noteworthy cities are the major seaport Gijón, the largest city in Asturias, and the industrial town of Avilés. It is situated on the north coast facing the Cantabrian Sea (Mar Cantábrico, the Spanish name for the Bay of Biscay).

The Principality of Asturias (Asturian: Principau d'Asturies or Asturies) has an extensive history and is an autonomous community within the country of Spain.