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.
From Velez Rubio it runs 177 km to Velez Rubio; allow about 4 h 26 of riding. The stops in between: Izquierda E. de Santonje, Abrigo de los Gavilanes and back through Izquierda E. de Santonje. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 1,250 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available. The line favours views over speed.
There is a little figure on a postcard from Almería that you will see on car stickers, jewellery and shop signs across the province, and it started here. The Indalo, a stick-like man holding an arch above his head, is the symbol of Almería, and it comes from a painting in the Cueva de los Letreros near Vélez-Blanco. The painted figure, called the Brujo or Sorcerer, was found in the early twentieth century, and local people adopted the shape as a good-luck charm and a mark of local pride.
Read the complete Letreros write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Letreros is where the day begins. Next is Izquierda E. de Santonje, 20 km on.
The Indalo is everywhere in Almería: a little stick figure holding an arc over its head, painted on houses, sold as a souvenir and used as the symbol of the province. It comes from a rock shelter near Vélez-Blanco, the Cueva de los Letreros, where it was painted in prehistoric times, and the area around the village is rich in rock art, part of the World Heritage rock art of the Mediterranean. The shelters around Santonje, near the villages of María and Vélez-Blanco, are among them.
Read the complete Izquierda E. de Santonje write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Izquierda E. de Santonje comes up about 20 km into the recorded legs. Next is Abrigo de los Gavilanes.
Gavilanes means sparrowhawks, and the name fits a shelter high on a limestone face above the dry country where Murcia meets Almería. The Abrigo de los Gavilanes lies in the hills west of Lorca, in an area scattered with painted shelters such as the Collado de la Cruz and Los Grajos, the jackdaws, and it is part of the World Heritage Site of Rock Art of the Mediterranean Basin on the Iberian Peninsula. The figures are small, red and schematic, painted by communities who farmed and herded here thousands of years ago.
Read the complete Abrigo de los Gavilanes write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 88 km into the recorded legs you reach Abrigo de los Gavilanes. Next is back through Izquierda E. de Santonje, 20 km on.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Izquierda E. de Santonje write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Izquierda E. de Santonje, late in the day. Next is Letreros.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Letreros write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Back at Letreros. That is the ride.
Letreros → Izquierda E. de Santonje is 20 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Izquierda E. de Santonje → Abrigo de los Gavilanes is 68 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Abrigo de los Gavilanes → back through Izquierda E. de Santonje is 70 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Izquierda E. de Santonje → Letreros is 18 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.