El Valle de Los Caídos (The Valley of the Fallen) is a monument of post-civil-war reconciliation. The main basilica is an excavation within a mountain with a long stairway leading to the entrance. It is crowned by a huge cross (148 m / 486 ft) that weights over 180,000 metric tons.
The construction began in the 1941 by order of General Francisco Franco, Head of Spain at that time. It took eighteen years to accomplish this feat. Prisoners of the Spanish Civil War who worked there, got 3 days off of their sentence for every day spent excavating the mountain. The crypt of basilica holds the remains of many of those who fought in that war. Francisco Franco in also buried there.
