CURVESCOUT / MOTORCYCLE RIDE
Ordered leg totals agree within rounding. Stop distances are approximate sums of rounded legs. Stops, delays, approach and any separate return travel add time. Basis: producer-declared routed record.
Reading history stays on this device. My road watch requires a separate selection; opening it does not subscribe this ride.
Distance and riding time are measured on the routed road. Check local closures and conditions before you ride.
185 km from Santillana to Santillana, about 2 h 51 of riding. On the way it passes Chemin de la Liébana, Llonín, Covaciella and back through Llonín. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 1,100 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available. It was put together for the scenery rather than the shortest line.
Expect company on a summer weekend. Early is better than fast. For about 24 km this is Picos de Europa Loop, a road with a name of its own and a reason for it.
In 1879 a little girl lost interest in her father's digging and wandered further into a cave in Cantabria. She looked up and saw bulls on the ceiling. The father, Marcelino Sanz de Sautuola, a local landowner and amateur archaeologist, was digging in the floor of Altamira, a cave a hunter had stumbled on some years earlier. When he announced that the paintings were of the Ice Age, the experts of Europe laughed at him, and it was not until 1902, after similar paintings turned up in France, that the leading sceptic published a famous apology. Sautuola died long before that.
Read the complete Cave of Altamira and Paleolithic Cave Art write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Cave of Altamira and Paleolithic Cave Art is where the day begins. Next is Chemin de la Liébana.
San Vicente de la Barquera is where the Camino Lebaniego begins, the old pilgrim route that leaves the Cantabrian coast and climbs south into the mountains of Liébana to the monastery of Santo Toribio. The town sits on a pair of estuaries, with a long medieval bridge carrying the road across the water, a castle and the Gothic church of Santa María above the harbour, and on clear days the snowy peaks of the Picos de Europa rising behind the marshes like a stage set.
Read the complete Chemin de la Liébana write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Chemin de la Liébana comes up about 37 km into the recorded legs. Next is Llonín.
The cave of Llonín is not one you can walk into. It sits in the valley of the river Cares in Peñamellera Alta, in the far east of Asturias, and it is one of the decorated Palaeolithic caves of northern Spain listed by UNESCO alongside Altamira. Its walls hold engravings and paintings of deer, goats and other animals, and the cave has been studied by archaeologists for decades, but access is restricted to protect the art. What you get instead is the landscape that sheltered those artists, and that is very much worth the trip.
Read the complete Llonín write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 66 km into the recorded legs you reach Llonín. Next is Covaciella.
Between the coastal town of Llanes and the high limestone walls of the Picos de Europa, a small cave near Carreña de Cabrales holds images that have been in the dark for something like fifteen thousand years. Covaciella was only found in the 1990s, and its paintings of bison, horses and deer, in black and red, are among the finest examples of Palaeolithic art in Asturias. It was added to the UNESCO listing of the Cave of Altamira and Paleolithic Cave Art of Northern Spain in 2008. The cave is closed to the public to protect the paintings, but the nearby interpretation centre explains what is inside and why it matters.
Read the complete Covaciella write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Covaciella, about halfway. Next is back through Llonín.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Llonín write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Llonín sits at 112 km, about halfway. Next is back through Chemin de la Liébana.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Chemin de la Liébana write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Chemin de la Liébana comes up about 148 km into the recorded legs. Next is Cave of Altamira and Paleolithic Cave Art.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Cave of Altamira and Paleolithic Cave Art write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Cave of Altamira and Paleolithic Cave Art closes the day.
Cave of Altamira and Paleolithic Cave Art → Chemin de la Liébana is 37 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Chemin de la Liébana → Llonín is 29 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Llonín → Covaciella is 24 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Covaciella → back through Llonín is 29 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Llonín → back through Chemin de la Liébana is 29 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Chemin de la Liébana → Cave of Altamira and Paleolithic Cave Art is 37 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.