The sabina is the Spanish juniper, a tough, aromatic tree that grows on the high limestone plateaus of the interior, and the Abrigo de los Sabinares, also called the Ventana de los E, lies in a country where junipers cover the slopes in dark green clumps. The shelter sits eight kilometres from Nerpio, in the high basin of the Sierra del Segura, and it is one of the cluster of painted rocks that UNESCO listed in 1998 as part of the Mediterranean arc. Its neighbours on the route, the Cueva de los Pucheros and the Abrigo de la Fuente, are in the same district.
Juniper wood has a long human history. Its resin is rich in oils that resist rot, and builders used it for roof beams in old farmhouses, some of which are still standing after four or five hundred years. The wood is aromatic and used for carving, and the berries, dark blue in autumn, are used as a flavouring and as the main ingredient of gin. In the Nerpio district the junipers are slow-growing and ancient, and some are said to be centuries old.
The roads here are the pleasure of the high plateau. They run straight and then bend, climbing gently over passes and dropping into basins, and the juniper scrub lines the verges. The air is dry and fragrant, especially after rain, and the light has a hard clarity. There is little traffic. Ride carefully in winter, because the plateau gets heavy frost and the occasional fall of snow, and in summer, when thunderstorms build in the afternoon.
Services are limited, and fuel is the main issue. Nerpio is eight kilometres from the shelter, and Yeste, twenty-seven kilometres away, is the nearest reliable town, with Huéscar thirty-eight kilometres to the south. A basic lunch is possible in Nerpio, and it will probably include lamb or game. Carry water and a map, and do not rely on the phone. The walk to the shelter is moderate but exposed.