The Millares country belongs to the Júcar, the long river that cuts through the limestone of inland Valencia and fills the reservoir at Tous before spilling out onto the orange-growing plain. Millares itself has fewer than six hundred people and sits in a landscape of gorges, ravines and dry hills, with Dos Aguas nearby in a similar fold of the land. The Abric de las Cabras is in the hills a few kilometres from the village, a rock shelter whose name suggests the animals that still use these slopes.
The ride in is a pleasure. From Turís or Montroy, the road rises from irrigated fields and orange groves through citrus, then carob and almond, then pine and scrub as the valley narrows, with bends that tighten and open in a pleasing sequence. The surface is usually good, but expect narrow stretches and occasional gravel, and give a wide berth to any cyclist you meet. Summer is hot and the best months are April, May, October and November.
Local history has a long reach. The Júcar was a boundary and a corridor, and the hills here were part of a Muslim agricultural economy that used terraces and irrigation channels, many of which are still working. Dos Aguas has a name that refers to the meeting of two streams, and the Valencian aristocratic family that took the title built one of the most extravagant Baroque palaces in Valencia city, a bit of Rococo exuberance that has nothing in common with this quiet village. Rock shelters like the one here are the oldest layer of the story, painted by hunters.
Fuel is an issue to plan. Millares and Dos Aguas are small and unlikely to have pumps, so Turís, with about five thousand people, thirteen kilometres away, is the reliable stop, and Montroy has a few more services. Both have bars and shops, and the villages on the way offer simple lunches of paella and local sausages. Take water and a map, because mobile signal in the gorges can be patchy.