Lecina Superior and Abrigo de Santa Eulaliade la Peña
Plan this ride
Recorded distance
261 km
Riding-time estimate
4 h 31
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: 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.
A 261 km round trip from Bárcabo - roughly 4 h 31 in the saddle. It goes by way of Cueva de Pacencia, Abrigo de Santa Eulaliade la Peña and back through Cueva de Pacencia. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 1,050 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available. The line favours views over speed.
Waypoint introductions and full write-ups
1. Lecina Superior
It is a curious thing, but the shelters of the Vero valley are mostly found not in the canyon itself but on its upper edges, on the open hillside above the cliffs, where the early painters could look across a wide landscape. Lecina Superior, the upper Lecina, lies five kilometres from Alquézar on such a slope, and its name implies a lower twin. The paintings there belong to the Levantine rock art that UNESCO listed in 1998, and the habit of having a view seems to run through the whole tradition.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Lecina Superior is where the day begins. Next is Cueva de Pacencia.
2. Cueva de Pacencia
The Sierra de Guara is the first big wrinkle of the Pyrenees north of Huesca, a block of limestone sliced into deep canyons by rivers like the Vero, the Alcanadre and the Mascún, and the Cueva de Pacencia sits in that broken country. The shelters along the Vero hold prehistoric paintings in several styles, from the lively Levantine hunters to much more abstract schematic signs, and they are part of the UNESCO Rock Art of the Mediterranean Basin. The area is managed as the Río Vero Cultural Park, with an interpretation centre in Colungo and guided visits to the best-preserved shelters, which is the sensible way to see them.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Cueva de Pacencia comes up about 43 km into the recorded legs. Next is Abrigo de Santa Eulaliade la Peña.
3. Abrigo de Santa Eulaliade la Peña
Just north of Huesca, where the flat cereal land of the Hoya suddenly rears up into the first limestone walls of the Pre-Pyrenees, lies the little village of Nueno and, above it, the rock shelter named after Santa Eulalia de la Peña. This is the southern edge of the Sierra de Guara country, a landscape of gorges, conglomerate cliffs and scrub where griffon vultures ride the thermals and the light comes hard off pale stone.