Why this ride
A 109 km round trip from Santillana - roughly 2 h 02 in the saddle. On the way it passes El Pendo, La Garma and back through El Pendo. The line favours views over speed.
CURVESCOUT / MOTORCYCLE RIDE
Collégiale de Santa Juliana et son Cloître and La Garma
Plan this ride
- Recorded distance
- 109 km
- Riding-time estimate
- 2 h 02
- Journey
- Recorded itinerary
Distance and timing basis
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.
Waypoint introductions and full write-ups
1. Collégiale de Santa Juliana et son Cloître
The saying goes that Santillana del Mar is the town of three lies, since it is not holy, not flat and has no sea, and the truth is that it is none of those things and one of the prettiest villages in northern Spain. The name comes from Santa Juliana, a martyr whose relics are kept in the collegiate church, and the town grew up around the monastery that held them in the early Middle Ages. Stone houses with carved coats of arms, wooden balconies and cobbled streets line the main road, and cows still wander through the lanes at times.
Read the complete Collégiale de Santa Juliana et son Cloître write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Collégiale de Santa Juliana et son Cloître is where the day begins. Next is El Pendo.
2. El Pendo
In 1997, in a cave that people had been visiting for over a century, a group of researchers noticed paintings that everyone had walked past: a frieze of red figures, deer, horses and goats, high on a wall in the main chamber. El Pendo, in the municipality of Camargo just south of Santander, had long been known for its deep layers of Stone Age occupation, but the frieze made it one of the important painted caves of Cantabria, and in 2008 it joined the World Heritage listing of the Paleolithic cave art of northern Spain alongside Altamira.
Read the complete El Pendo write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
El Pendo comes up about 27 km into the recorded legs. Next is La Garma.
3. La Garma
La Garma is a low limestone hill a few kilometres inland from the Bay of Santander, green with meadows and oak scrub, the sort of rounded Cantabrian hump you might ride past without a second glance. Inside it lies one of the most important prehistoric caves in Europe. Found by chance in the 1990s, the cave of La Garma contains not just paintings but preserved living floors from the Palaeolithic: hearths, bones, tools and the outlines of shelters left exactly as they were when a rockfall sealed the entrance thousands of years ago. It forms part of the UNESCO site of the Cave of Altamira and Palaeolithic Cave Art of Northern Spain.
Read the complete La Garma write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
about 56 km into the recorded legs you reach La Garma. Next is back through El Pendo.
4. back through El Pendo
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete El Pendo write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
back through El Pendo, late in the day. Next is Collégiale de Santa Juliana et son Cloître.
5. Collégiale de Santa Juliana et son Cloître
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Collégiale de Santa Juliana et son Cloître write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Back at Collégiale de Santa Juliana et son Cloître. That is the ride.
Leg by leg
Collégiale de Santa Juliana et son Cloître to El Pendo
Collégiale de Santa Juliana et son Cloître → El Pendo is 27 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
El Pendo to La Garma
El Pendo → La Garma is 29 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
La Garma to back through El Pendo
La Garma → back through El Pendo is 29 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through El Pendo to Collégiale de Santa Juliana et son Cloître
back through El Pendo → Collégiale de Santa Juliana et son Cloître is 25 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.