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 Puente Viesgo it runs 254 km to Puente Viesgo; allow about 3 h 55 of riding. The stops in between: La Garma, Covalanas, Eglise Santa Maria de la Asuncion and back through Covalanas. It was put together for the scenery rather than the shortest line.
Some of the oldest paintings in Europe sit in a hill above a village best known for its hot springs. The cave of El Castillo opens in the flank of Monte Castillo, right above Puente Viesgo in the Pas valley of Cantabria, and inside it are hand stencils and a red disc that scientists dated, in 2012, to more than forty thousand years ago. That makes them contenders for the oldest cave art known on the continent, and possibly older than any made by modern humans, since Neanderthals were around at the time. UNESCO lists the Cantabrian caves, and a visit means a guided group entering in small numbers, so book ahead and expect limits on the day.
Read the complete Monte Castillo - El Castillo write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Monte Castillo - El Castillo is where the day begins. 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 comes up about 36 km into the recorded legs. Next is Covalanas.
Covalanas is known as the cave of the red deer. Its walls carry red ochre paintings of hinds, drawn in a distinctive dotted technique, and they are among the finest Palaeolithic paintings in the Cantabrian region. The cave sits on a steep, wooded hillside above Ramales de la Victoria, in eastern Cantabria, and it was one of the first painted caves to be recognised in Spain, in the early twentieth century. It is part of the UNESCO-listed Cave of Altamira and Palaeolithic Cave Art of Northern Spain, and visits are limited to small groups, so booking ahead is advisable.
Read the complete Covalanas write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 80 km into the recorded legs you reach Covalanas. Next is Eglise Santa Maria de la Asuncion.
Castro-Urdiales has one of the best harbour fronts on the whole Cantabrian coast, and it knows it. The Gothic church of Santa María de la Asunción stands on a rocky headland above the old port, its buttresses and pinnacles silhouetted against the sea, flanked by the remains of a castle that now holds a lighthouse and by a medieval bridge leading to a little chapel on a rock. Built from the thirteenth century onward, the church is one of the finest Gothic buildings in northern Spain, and it lies on the coastal route of the Way of Saint James, which is part of a UNESCO listing that covers the pilgrimage roads of the north.
Read the complete Eglise Santa Maria de la Asuncion write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Eglise Santa Maria de la Asuncion, about halfway. Next is back through Covalanas.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Covalanas write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Covalanas sits at 144 km, about halfway. Next is back through La Garma.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete La Garma write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through La Garma comes up about 218 km into the recorded legs. Next is Monte Castillo - El Castillo.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Monte Castillo - El Castillo write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Monte Castillo - El Castillo closes the day.
Monte Castillo - El Castillo → La Garma is 36 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
La Garma → Covalanas is 44 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Covalanas → Eglise Santa Maria de la Asuncion is 47 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Eglise Santa Maria de la Asuncion → back through Covalanas is 47 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Covalanas → back through La Garma is 44 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through La Garma → Monte Castillo - El Castillo is 36 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.