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.
433 km from Potes to Potes, about 6 h 32 of riding. It goes by way of Covaciella, El Pindal, Altamira and La Garma. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 1,300 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available. The line favours views over speed.
Expect company on a summer weekend. Early is better than fast. For about 60 km this is Picos de Europa Loop, a road with a name of its own and a reason for it.
Liébana is a green bowl surrounded by mountains, a valley system in south-west Cantabria with the town of Potes at its centre and the limestone towers of the Picos de Europa rising to the north and west. On a hillside above Potes, among oak and chestnut woods, stands the monastery of Santo Toribio, one of the holy places of Christian Spain. It keeps the Lignum Crucis, said to be the largest surviving fragment of the True Cross, and for that reason it holds a jubilee year whenever the feast of Saint Toribio, the sixteenth of April, falls on a Sunday.
Read the complete Monastère de Santo Toribio de Liébana write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Monastère de Santo Toribio de Liébana is where the day begins. Next is Covaciella.
Between the coastal town of Llanes and the high limestone walls of the Picos de Europa, a small cave near Carreña de Cabrales holds images that have been in the dark for something like fifteen thousand years. Covaciella was only found in the 1990s, and its paintings of bison, horses and deer, in black and red, are among the finest examples of Palaeolithic art in Asturias. It was added to the UNESCO listing of the Cave of Altamira and Paleolithic Cave Art of Northern Spain in 2008. The cave is closed to the public to protect the paintings, but the nearby interpretation centre explains what is inside and why it matters.
Read the complete Covaciella write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Covaciella comes up about 60 km into the recorded legs. Next is El Pindal.
On the coast of eastern Asturias, near the village of Pimiango, a cave opens in the cliffs above the sea, and inside, Palaeolithic artists painted and engraved animals on the walls: a mammoth, horses, a bison, a fish, and many red dots and signs. El Pindal is one of the caves included in the World Heritage listing of the Cave of Altamira and Paleolithic Cave Art of Northern Spain, and its location, with the sea pounding the rocks below and the Picos de Europa rising inland, is spectacular. Visits are limited and guided, to protect the paintings.
Read the complete El Pindal write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 111 km into the recorded legs you reach El Pindal. Next is Altamira.
In 1879 a nine-year-old girl named María was exploring a cave near Santillana del Mar with her father, Marcelino Sanz de Sautuola, an amateur archaeologist. While he dug in the floor, she looked up at the ceiling and saw painted animals. The bison of Altamira, painted in red and black on the uneven rock so that their bodies seem to swell and move in the flickering light, are among the greatest works of prehistoric art in the world. When Sautuola published his discovery, most experts refused to believe that cavemen could have produced such sophisticated paintings, and he was accused of fraud. He died before he was vindicated; only after similar paintings were found in France did the leading sceptic, Émile Cartailhac, publish a famous apology. Altamira was listed by UNESCO in 1985.
Read the complete Altamira write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Altamira, about halfway. Next is La Garma.
La Garma is a low limestone hill a few kilometres inland from the Bay of Santander, green with meadows and oak scrub, the sort of rounded Cantabrian hump you might ride past without a second glance. Inside it lies one of the most important prehistoric caves in Europe. Found by chance in the 1990s, the cave of La Garma contains not just paintings but preserved living floors from the Palaeolithic: hearths, bones, tools and the outlines of shelters left exactly as they were when a rockfall sealed the entrance thousands of years ago. It forms part of the UNESCO site of the Cave of Altamira and Palaeolithic Cave Art of Northern Spain.
Read the complete La Garma write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
La Garma sits at 170 km, about halfway. Next is back through Altamira.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Altamira write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Altamira comes up about 268 km into the recorded legs. Next is back through El Pindal.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete El Pindal write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 323 km into the recorded legs you reach back through El Pindal. Next is back through Covaciella.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Covaciella write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Covaciella, late in the day. Next is Monastère de Santo Toribio de Liébana.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Monastère de Santo Toribio de Liébana write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The route ends here after 433 km.
Monastère de Santo Toribio de Liébana → Covaciella is 60 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Covaciella → El Pindal is 51 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
El Pindal → Altamira is 53 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Altamira → La Garma is 52 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
La Garma → back through Altamira is 52 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Altamira → back through El Pindal is 55 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through El Pindal → back through Covaciella is 51 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Covaciella → Monastère de Santo Toribio de Liébana is 60 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.