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.
177 km from Socovos to Socovos, about 4 h 54 of riding. On the way it passes Cavidad V, Arroyo de la fuente de las Zorras, Cavidad VI and back through Arroyo de la fuente de las Zorras. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 1,400 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available.
This is the country of the upper Segura, where Albacete and Murcia meet, and it is among the least visited corners of southern Spain. The river cuts through limestone sierras, with pine forests, reedy banks and small terraced fields where almond and olive trees grow, and the villages, Socovos and Férez among them, are small, white and quiet. The scale of the land is bigger than its population, and in summer the cicadas are the loudest thing you will hear.
Read the complete Cueva de los Cascarones write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Cueva de los Cascarones is where the day begins. Next is Cavidad V.
Nerpio is about as far from anywhere as you can get in mainland Spain. This village of around sixteen hundred people sits in the Sierra del Segura, in the far south-west of Albacete province, close to the borders of Murcia and Andalusia, and the surrounding hills are dotted with shelters containing prehistoric paintings. The numbered sites around here, Cavidad V among them, are part of the UNESCO-listed Rock Art of the Mediterranean Basin, and the Nerpio area is one of the richest concentrations of Levantine art in Spain, with hunting scenes, archers and animals painted thousands of years ago.
Read the complete Cavidad V write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Cavidad V comes up about 24 km into the recorded legs. Next is Arroyo de la fuente de las Zorras.
The name means the stream of the foxes' spring, which is the kind of place name that only survives in country where people still walk. The ravines around Nerpio hold dozens of painted rock shelters, with Levantine and Schematic paintings of hunters, animals and symbols, and they form part of the UNESCO listing of rock art of the Mediterranean Basin on the Iberian Peninsula. Visits to many of them need to be arranged through the local interpretation centre.
Read the complete Arroyo de la fuente de las Zorras write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 49 km into the recorded legs you reach Arroyo de la fuente de las Zorras. Next is Cavidad VI.
Nerpio is a village of sixteen hundred people at more than a thousand metres in south-west Albacete, and the area is among the richest in Spain for prehistoric painting. The shelter at Cavidad VI is one of dozens, in the Levantine tradition protected by UNESCO as part of the Mediterranean rock art of Spain, and the ride links it with a site called Las Cazuelas, the Cooking Pots, and a cave named for a Gypsy, Cueva del Gitano, a name that probably recalls a squatter or a shepherd rather than any famous event. The label Cavidad, meaning a cavity, tells you something about the people who numbered these places. They were archaeologists with a long list of holes in the rock.
Read the complete Cavidad VI write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Cavidad VI, about halfway. Next is back through Arroyo de la fuente de las Zorras.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Arroyo de la fuente de las Zorras write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Arroyo de la fuente de las Zorras sits at 100 km, about halfway. Next is back through Cavidad V.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Cavidad V write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Cavidad V comes up about 153 km into the recorded legs. Next is Cueva de los Cascarones.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Cueva de los Cascarones write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Cueva de los Cascarones closes the day.
Cueva de los Cascarones → Cavidad V is 24 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Cavidad V → Arroyo de la fuente de las Zorras is 25 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Arroyo de la fuente de las Zorras → Cavidad VI is 41 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Cavidad VI → back through Arroyo de la fuente de las Zorras is 25 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Arroyo de la fuente de las Zorras → back through Cavidad V is 38 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Cavidad V → Cueva de los Cascarones is 24 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.