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.
A 288 km round trip from María - roughly 8 h 45 in the saddle. The stops in between: Central E. de Santonje, Las Covaticas I, Cueva de la Plata and back through Las Covaticas I. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 1,300 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available. It was put together for the scenery rather than the shortest line.
The Vélez comarca in northern Almería sits high and dry, a land of almond trees, steppe and pale limestone ranges that feels more like the Castilian interior than the beach resorts of the south coast. Lázar lies in this country, near the villages of María and Vélez-Blanco, within the Sierra María-Los Vélez natural park. The area is known for some of the most important prehistoric art in Andalusia, and the best-known symbol is the Indalo, a little stick figure holding an arc above its head, taken from a painting in the cave of Los Letreros near Vélez-Blanco and adopted as the emblem of the whole province.
Read the complete Lázar write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Lázar is where the day begins. Next is Central E. de Santonje, 33 km on.
The Indalo, a little stick figure holding an arc over its head, is now the symbol of the whole province of Almería, painted on houses, cars and souvenirs, and it comes from a rock shelter here in the hills around Vélez-Blanco. The Cueva de los Letreros, a few kilometres from this point, holds the original among other paintings of the Levantine and schematic styles, and the shelters of the Sierra de María are part of the World Heritage Site of Rock Art of the Mediterranean Basin on the Iberian Peninsula, inscribed in 1998. Santonje, as the area is called, is one of a cluster of sites in these mountains.
Read the complete Central E. de Santonje write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Central E. de Santonje comes up about 22 km into the recorded legs. Next is Las Covaticas I.
The name Las Covaticas means the little caves, and the whole area south of Vélez Blanco is a country of small hollows in the rock. The ground rises from the plain of Vélez Rubio to the long ridges of the Sierra de María, where pine forests and bare slopes meet wide sky, and the air at more than a thousand metres feels cool and thin. Vélez Rubio, a town of about 7,000 people 15 km away, is the largest place in the area, with a grand baroque church that seems too big for its surroundings. The Renaissance castle of Vélez Blanco stands nearby on its crag.
Read the complete Las Covaticas I write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 81 km into the recorded legs you reach Las Covaticas I. Next is Cueva de la Plata.
Aledo is a tiny village on a rocky spur in the hills of Murcia, a place that punches well above its weight in history. In the eleventh century, it was a fortress on the frontier between Christian Castile and the Muslim taifa kingdoms, and the siege of Aledo in 1088 was a major episode in the struggle for the peninsula. A tower still stands above the village. The Cueva de la Plata, the silver cave, lies in the hills nearby, between Aledo, Totana and Alhama de Murcia.
Read the complete Cueva de la Plata write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Cueva de la Plata, about halfway. Next is back through Las Covaticas I.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Las Covaticas I write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Las Covaticas I sits at 131 km, about halfway. Next is back through Central E. de Santonje, 32 km on.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Central E. de Santonje write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Central E. de Santonje comes up about 264 km into the recorded legs. Next is Lázar.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Lázar write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Lázar closes the day.
Lázar → Central E. de Santonje is 22 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Central E. de Santonje → Las Covaticas I is 59 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Las Covaticas I → Cueva de la Plata is 63 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Cueva de la Plata → back through Las Covaticas I is 63 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Las Covaticas I → back through Central E. de Santonje is 57 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Central E. de Santonje → Lázar is 24 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.