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: planning record, not independently verified geometry.
Reading history stays on this device. My road watch requires a separate selection; opening it does not subscribe this ride.
Distances and riding times are planning figures. Check local closures and conditions before you ride.
From Alquézar it runs 208 km to Alquézar; allow about 3 h 36 of riding. The stops in between: Cueva Peña Miel I, Chaves I and back through Cueva Peña Miel I. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 1,100 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available. The line favours views over speed.
Barely five hundred metres from the centre of Alquézar, the Cueva Palomera takes its name from the doves that nested in it, a palomera being a dovecote. That makes it the closest of all the painted shelters on this list to a village, and the easiest to fit into a day of riding. The cave is among the sites catalogued in the Vero valley and falls within the UNESCO listing of the Mediterranean rock art of the Iberian Peninsula. Whether any paintings are visible, and whether the cave is open to visitors, you should check locally, because access rules change.
Read the complete Cueva Palomera write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Cueva Palomera is where the day begins. Next is Cueva Peña Miel I.
The Sierra de Guara, in the province of Huesca, is a limestone range riddled with canyons, and the river Vero cuts one of the most beautiful of them, a deep, narrow gorge of grey and ochre cliffs where vultures nest and the water runs clear over pale stones. Along its walls, prehistoric people left paintings in dozens of rock shelters, and the Cueva Peña Miel I is one of them, part of the UNESCO listing of rock art of the Mediterranean Basin. The Río Vero Cultural Park protects the area, with an interpretation centre in Colungo and guided visits to some of the shelters.
Read the complete Cueva Peña Miel I write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Cueva Peña Miel I comes up about 44 km into the recorded legs. Next is 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.
Read the complete Chaves I write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 104 km into the recorded legs you reach Chaves I. Next is back through Cueva Peña Miel I.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Cueva Peña Miel I write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Cueva Peña Miel I, late in the day. Next is Cueva Palomera.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Cueva Palomera write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Back at Cueva Palomera. That is the ride.
Cueva Palomera → Cueva Peña Miel I is 44 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Cueva Peña Miel I → Chaves I is 60 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Chaves I → back through Cueva Peña Miel I is 60 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Cueva Peña Miel I → Cueva Palomera is 44 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.