Where the Ebro, the Segre and the Cinca meet in eastern Aragon, a vast reservoir stretches for dozens of kilometres between bare, ochre hills. The locals call it the Mar de Aragón, the Sea of Aragon, and it was created in the 1960s when the Mequinenza dam flooded the valley. The old town of Mequinenza went under the water too, and its people were moved to a new town built above, a story told in moving detail in the local museums and in the novels of Jesús Moncada, who grew up there.
In the hills around, sheltered under rock overhangs, are the paintings of Valmayor IV and its neighbours, part of the Levantine rock art inscribed by UNESCO as the Rock Art of the Mediterranean Basin on the Iberian Peninsula. The figures are small, fragile and often fenced off, and the shelters are not always easy to find without directions, so ask at the tourist offices in Mequinenza or Caspe before setting out on foot.
This is a dry, open country, half desert, with gypsum and limestone hills, thyme and esparto grass, almond and olive groves where there is enough water, and very few people. The light is sharp and the summer heat can be brutal. The reservoir has made the area famous among anglers from all over Europe, who come for the enormous wels catfish that grow here, some of them longer than a person.
The riding is open and fast, with long sightlines across the hills and few cars. Roads follow the edge of the reservoir and cross the hills in long, flowing curves, with occasional tight sections where they drop to the water. Surfaces are generally good, but watch for gravel washed onto the road after storms and for the strong winds that sweep across the plateau. Spring and autumn are the best seasons; in July and August ride early and rest through the afternoon, as the locals do.
Caspe, about eighteen kilometres away, is the main town, with fuel, shops and restaurants; it is also famous in Spanish history as the place where a dispute over the crown of Aragon was settled in 1412. Mequinenza has services too. A long lunch in either town, followed by a swim or a walk along the water, is the right rhythm here.