Selva Pascuala is the name of a patch of pine and rock in the Serranía de Cuenca, above the village of Villar del Humo, and it is the name by which one of the best-known groups of Levantine rock paintings is known. The figures were painted in a rock shelter by people who lived by hunting and gathering, and perhaps by the first herding, some six to ten thousand years ago, although dating the pigment is hard and scholars still argue about it. The paintings show animals, including deer and wild goats, and human figures, small and lively, painted in a deep red that has survived because the shelter's overhang kept the rain off.
What strikes people who see them is the movement. The artists captured a running deer with a handful of strokes, and gave human figures slender limbs and a sense of action. They seem to tell stories, though nobody now knows which. The group is part of the listing that UNESCO made in 1998 for the rock art of the Mediterranean Basin on the Iberian Peninsula, and because the paintings are fragile, access is controlled. Ask in the village for current rules before you walk out, and never touch the rock, even to test whether a figure is real.
This is a good corner of Spain for a rider who likes quiet. The high plateau is cut by gorges, among them the Cabriel, whose clear water runs in a deep canyon through pines, and the road threads through it with bends and climbs that keep you busy without being punishing. Autumn is particularly good, with the oaks turning bronze and the air smelling of mushrooms and wet earth. In midsummer it is hot in the day, but nights stay cool at this height, around a thousand metres. Fog and cold rain come in autumn and winter, and snow is possible.
Services are scarce. Villar del Humo has only a few hundred people, and Carboneras de Guadazaón and Cañete are small, so top the tank in a bigger town before going in, and bring something to eat. A walk from the road to the shelter is short, but the path may be rough. The silence of the place, broken only by wind in the pines and the occasional call of a raven, makes you feel the distance between the painters and yourself shrink a little.