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.
A 400 km round trip from Casbas de Huesca - roughly 7 h 34 in the saddle. On the way it passes Forau del Cocho, Abrigo de Los Gitanos, Cueva de los moros. and Hayedos de Navarra - Aztaparreta. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 1,450 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available. It was put together for the scenery rather than the shortest line.
Waypoint introductions and full write-ups
1. Chaves I
The Cueva de Chaves, in the foothills of the Sierra de Guara in Huesca, was one of the most important Neolithic sites in the Iberian Peninsula, with deposits showing some of the earliest farming and herding in north-eastern Spain. In 2007, in an act that caused outrage, the landowner bulldozed the cave's floor deposits, destroying much of the archaeological record, and the case went to court. Rock art shelters in the area, including Chaves I and others in the Vero river valley, survive and are part of the Rock Art of the Mediterranean Basin listing, with paintings ranging from Palaeolithic to schematic art.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Chaves I is where the day begins. Next is Forau del Cocho.
2. Forau del Cocho
South of Huesca the land opens out. The Pyrenees are behind you, a snowy line on a clear day, and ahead stretches the gently rolling cereal country that eventually turns into the dry steppes of Los Monegros. Forau del Cocho lies in this transitional landscape, between Torres de Barbués, Almuniente and the outskirts of Huesca itself, a place where the only relief is the occasional low ridge or gully cut into soft rock.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Forau del Cocho comes up about 47 km into the recorded legs. Next is Abrigo de Los Gitanos.
3. Abrigo de Los Gitanos
The road north-west out of Huesca toward Pamplona runs along the foot of a dramatic wall of rock. To the north are the Pre-Pyrenean sierras, and studded along them are some of Aragón's most striking sights: the Castle of Loarre, a superbly preserved Romanesque fortress on a spur, and the Mallos de Riglos, huge red conglomerate towers rising straight out of the hillside. The rock shelter known as the Abrigo de los Gitanos lies in this country, between Ayerbe, Loarre and Luesia.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
about 109 km into the recorded legs you reach Abrigo de Los Gitanos. Next is Cueva de los moros., 47 km on.
4. Cueva de los moros.
There is a Cueva de los Moros in half the valleys of Spain. Every unexplained cave, ruin or rock shelter used to be credited to the Moors, and this one, in the hills of the western Aragonese Pyrenees between the valleys of Hecho and Ansó, is a rock shelter with ancient traces. You should approach it as an excuse to spend time in two of the most beautiful and least spoiled valleys of the Pyrenees, rather than as a monument.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Cueva de los moros., about halfway. Next is Hayedos de Navarra - Aztaparreta.
5. Hayedos de Navarra - Aztaparreta
Aztaparreta is a beech forest that has been left alone. High in the Pyrenees of Navarre, at the head of the Roncal valley, in the karst massif of Larra-Belagua on the border with France, this forest has never been logged, and its trees, some of them centuries old, grow, die and decay naturally. It is one of the components of the Ancient and Primeval Beech Forests of the Carpathians and Other Regions of Europe, a World Heritage Site that brings together beech forests from across the continent, from the Carpathians to the Pyrenees. Walking through it is like entering a cathedral, with tall grey trunks, a green canopy high above, and a thick carpet of moss and fallen leaves.