Quesada is an olive town, and the hills around it are a sea of silver-green trees running up to the foot of the Cazorla ranges. Cerro Vitar rises just over three kilometres from the town, a low rocky hill on the edge of the Sierra de Quesada, where the groves end and the limestone begins. The shelter that bears its name is one of several in the district that carry prehistoric paintings, part of the Mediterranean Basin rock art that UNESCO listed in 1998.
Quesada's best-known son is the painter Rafael Zabaleta, who spent his life painting the farmers and labourers of this country in broad, heavy forms, and the museum devoted to him in the town is a good place to understand the people behind the olive oil. The town has just under six thousand inhabitants, so it has fuel, shops, bars and a couple of places to sleep, and it is the sensible place to restock before heading into the mountains.
The riding is quietly excellent. From Quesada the road climbs through olive terraces, then through pine forest into the Sierra de Cazorla, Segura y Las Villas, the biggest protected area in Spain. The bends are long and well banked, and the views, over rows of olives that seem to ripple across the hills, are wide. The surface is mostly good, though some rural roads are patchy, and traffic is light outside the harvest season, when tractors and trucks carry the olives to the mills between November and January.
Summer is very hot, with afternoon temperatures that can pass forty degrees, so ride in the morning and keep water in the bike. Spring brings green slopes and flowers, while autumn is mild and the light is warm. Winter is cool, and frost can form on the higher roads.
For food, look for dishes built on the local oil: toasted bread with oil and tomato for breakfast, andrajos, a stew with flat pasta and rabbit, and ochÃos, small spiced bread rolls. Huesa, about six kilometres away, is smaller but also has places to eat. The ride joins this shelter with the Covachicas and the Cerro de la Caldera.