Vélez-Blanco has a castle that has been in two countries. Built in the early sixteenth century by the first Marquis of los Vélez, it was a Renaissance palace of white marble inside a fortified shell, and in 1904 the owner sold the marble patio, which was shipped in crates to Paris and then to New York, where it is now in the Metropolitan Museum. The castle's empty courtyard remains in the village. Lavadero Tello is sixteen kilometres away, in the Sierra María-Los Vélez natural park, where red-and-gold hills, almond groves and pale limestone peaks rise above the plains of Almería and Granada.
The Cueva de los Letreros, near Vélez-Blanco, is the reason this area has such a famous name in prehistoric art. Its paintings include a figure with raised arms holding a rainbow-like arc, known as the Indalo, which has been adopted as the symbol of the province of Almería and appears on stickers on bumpers across Spain. The shelter you reach here belongs to the same cluster of painted sites in the hills.
The road to this district is among the best in Almería. Sierra María rises to over two thousand metres at Maimón, and the roads approach through pine forests and rock, with long smooth curves and big views. The surface is mainly good, though there are patches of rough tarmac, and the area is dry and exposed so wind can be a factor. In winter snow falls on the high ground. Spring is beautiful, with wildflowers, and autumn is clear and warm.
Vélez-Rubio, with about seven thousand people, twenty-two kilometres away, is the town where you should buy fuel and food, and it has a famously grand Baroque church. Vélez-Blanco and María, a village of around fifteen hundred, offer more modest services. Local cooking features lamb, game, cured meats and almond sweets, and the high plains are known for their bread and honey. Take water if you intend to walk to the shelter, and mind the sun.