Trekking in Spain. All hikes in the mountains of the world. Routes in the El Monasterio de Piedra Natural Park in Aragon

If you want to get to know Spain from all sides, I suggest you “walk” with me along the lines of “The Way of St. James.”

In short:

the journey takes on average about 33 days (the French route, which is the most popular at this time)
The minimum amount you will have to invest in “enlightenment” is 0 rubles.
ahem. Let's be honest. From 70,000 thousand rubles. I will tell you more about the money item a little later.
“enlightenment” comes, but for different reasons. From understanding the frailty of existence to understanding oneself, who will try their best.
you will actually walk through the whole of Spain through the center and see the diversity and, alas, monotony of this wonderful country.

This was an introductory part, and now I will talk about my experience and share useful tips.

Days. Minutes. Time

In the first paragraph, I wrote that on average people walk for 33 days. I will say right away that these people are sprinters and are either always in good physical shape, or cannot go against their “guide”, which is bought in Saint-Jean-Pied-de-Port. This city is the starting point of your 800 km to go. The city is located on the border of Spain and France. If anything, now we are talking about the “French Way”. Its name comes from the point where you start.

So, in your paper navigator you are given the mileage, the heights to be overcome, and along the way - notes about the monuments you pass.

I’ll say right away that I’m not a very hiking person, so what was written here about 33 days didn’t work on me, because on average I had to walk 30 km a day. However, no matter how easy it may seem to you at first glance, in reality it is more and more difficult. Firstly, it’s hot, secondly, there are very slight changes in altitude, and thirdly, no one has canceled the blisters and pain from heavy backpacks. Therefore, if you set aside a month and a half for this journey, you will go through everything with pleasure and without pain.

It is better to choose the time of year according to your mood:

in winter there may be problems with crossing the Pyrenees,
In spring it may still be cool if you want to sleep in tents. (yes, yes, it’s cool! In July it was +9 in the mountains)
In summer, the sun burns relentlessly in the central part.
In the fall, towards the end, there may also be problems with crossing the mountains.

In my opinion, the best time is the end of spring, the beginning of autumn.

Money. Money. Money

Before going on a pilgrimage, I read a huge number of reviews about this whole thing, and, to be honest, it turned out to be completely the opposite. They said that you can practically not take money, but live in houses for the fact that you will help someone with the housework (cook food, mow the lawn) or, for example, there was an opinion that you can save money by staying in the cheapest shelters (in general , of course, they are called albergues, but as for me, dosshouses are a more appropriate word for such places).

I am a sociable person and ready to help anyone and everyone, no matter what, but you know, in 2017, it turns out that no one needs left-wing people who will cook in your home. Unexpected, right? It also turned out that money rules the world and the journey of pilgrims is no exception.

So, let's get down to the numbers:

Housing: minimum 10 euros per night. 10*40=400 euros

If anything, the accommodation is not like in hotels. And about 50 people can live in the room with you, at best 8-10. Very often there is no bed linen, sometimes there are no blankets, and everything doesn’t always smell nice.

Food: minimum 30 euros per day (breakfast, lunch, dinner)

If you buy it yourself and cook it, it’s cheaper. About 10-15 per person.

30*40=1200 euros.

15*40 = 600 euros.

The food in the cafe is generally delicious. There are cafes quite often along the way. They won't let you die of hunger.

Transport: if you are tired of walking and want to travel part of the way, there are many buses there and their ALSA bus system is well developed. Tickets are cheap, you can travel about 30 km for 3 euros.

But no one canceled the rides either.

Flight: We got a round-trip flight from Moscow to Madrid, via Germany - 14 thousand rubles, tickets were purchased in less than a month.

What to take with you

Take warm clothes too! Even if you go in the summer. It's really cold in the mountains. It could rain with hail or even snow at any moment. Take trekking shoes and some other comfortable sneakers, otherwise your feet will not rest.

It is advisable to take a sleeping bag, because very often there is no bed linen. Which is extremely unpleasant. There are many pharmacies there, so you don’t have to worry about a small first aid kit. BUT! As you know, they will not sell you antibiotics. Therefore, it is advisable to have something that will be useful to you. Plasters! Alcohol and iodine!

Enlightenment

I probably won’t talk much about this topic, because this path means something different for everyone. Some people go because of religious beliefs, others just for a walk. But, alas, many hope to become almost a saint along the way. If you are going there for this reason, then I advise you to save 120 thousand for something more interesting. Because you can only receive enlightenment when you are ready for it, and for this you need to make a huge journey within yourself and understand yourself, and not trod 800 km.

Here you can relax your soul, communicate with different people, learn about Spain and the Spaniards, but you can only find yourself within yourself. Actually, like God.

Beauty

Oh yes, this path is really beautiful. Especially at night when the stars illuminate your path. There is no crowd of Koreans walking next to you, with multicookers in their backpacks, the sun is not burning your head, the noise of the cities is not touching your ears. Night is generally a wonderful time, but when you walk with a wand through the fields and forests of Spain and think about something high and bright, the stars and night become even more magical. And it “goes faster”, to be honest.

There are many beautiful cities, and many others, large and smaller, many beautiful cathedrals and houses. Interesting nature, changing all the way.

In general, if you want to know Spain not only by its Barcelona, then the path is worth going through. The French way.

There are a few more, in the north of Spain, through Portugal, but that's... a completely different story. Thank you!

A little about trekking in Spain or what to do in the mountains of the province of Castellon. Having carefully studied the guidebook “50 treks in Spain”, bought at a local decathlon a couple of years earlier, I concluded that the most promising mountain areas can be found somewhere in the region of Andorra and the northern provinces in general, and in the east of the country there is only sand and Nordic walking . But it’s a long way from Andorra, and if you go to the beach often, you can become a roach, and I decided to look around for something of interest for short walks up.

The most accessible mountains are located near Benicassim in the territory of the National Park "Desert and Palmas - already a forest" (Natural Area Les Palmas Desert), where the CV-147 serpentine road leads to a mark of 400 m, on which there are more road cyclists than cars . On the territory of the park there are ancient ruins of a castle and chapels, a working monastery (obviously for women, otherwise why would they put so much asphalt at such a height), olive plantations, restaurants with views, and the mountains themselves. For the most part, the mountains are similar to the Khibiny Mountains, i.e. low (up to 800m) and so flat that primers lead upward to cell stations. But among them there was an interesting ridge with two distinct peaks, unlike anything else around. If you take the E-15 Autostrada Mediterraneo route north to Barcelona, these rocks stand out clearly among the other hills. On the maps these are peaks under the general name Agujas de Santa Agueda, but we simply called them “feathers”.

To get there, I had to get up at 6 am. Mainly due to the fact that I wanted to go for freshness, and not immediately go to the sauna. There are at least three different trails from the coast to the ridge, but I drove up CV-147 as far as possible, i.e. in fact to the bottom.

The ascent “from the side of the road” begins at 330m, the peak of the ridge closest to the road is only 538m, it’s a kilometer walk to get to it, although at first the 500m path winds with a smooth climb among tenacious and biting thorn bushes, and then the climbing begins along the stairs with high steps. In fact, there are no difficulties, except for reaching the very top: there is 10 m of rope hung there, behind which a half-meter-wide gap-corridor leads literally through the top to the eastern slope. It's simple.

1. This is what the ridge looks like from the east. If you wish, you can arrange an interesting trip for 6 hours from Benicassim to Oropesa.

2. The path to the top is not difficult to find. I used the OruxMaps application with a topo4u layer, it clearly shows the trails of at least this area (the trails are marked not by numbers, but by difficulty categories). The tour in the photo is one such tour, basically the trail is marked with small pyramids of two or three stones and a bunch of marks of various colors and shapes (Wikipedia generally says that making marks or signs with paint or other indelible materials is prohibited here). I came across at least four different markers on the path that already runs along the ridge, which does not prevent me from successfully losing this path, avoiding all sorts of ambushes.

3. Early morning over the Miravet valley. The sun only warms the eastern slope and it is very comfortable in the shade.

4. Natural Desierto de las Palmas, the Aguja del Salando ridge, and the next height with the ruins of Montornes Castle, for which they mainly go to this park de natural. The agglomeration on the horizon is the regional center of Castellon de la Plana (city, municipality, administrative center of the province).

5. At the top the views are everywhere - a continuous song. It was half past seven, it took 40 minutes to get up. I sit and look around the surrounding area, for example the resort town of Benicassim: continuous beaches, villas, hotels. Upon closer inspection, the shining puddles turned out to be tangerine plantations; we will raid them later.

6. In the background, the stone is the peak itself: it is impossible to climb it without equipment. There is not so much climbing on smooth stone, but an opportunity to completely fly away 15 meters and then transit along the slope with 12 photos.

7. And since it’s impossible to climb to the top, all the “conquerors” are drawn where their hands can reach. And I thought this cute tradition was only with us.

8. The entire eastern side of the Santa Agueda ridge is overgrown with mountain pine, which adds a “Needles” aroma to the atmosphere. The entire ridge is marked on the wiki as a micro-reserve where various endemics grow and therefore it is prohibited to “develop a mountaineering activity into a micro-reserve area unless specifically permitted for scientific or conservation purposes.” Most likely, mountaineering means drilling new routes, and not wandering back and forth along paths.

9. You won’t get bored with a bed of dry needles: in some places they lie in a thick carpet, which begins to slide down the rock under your feet. But in the crevices you can find secluded shelves for a tent (not big, but you can stick a tent like the marmot eos1), where you don’t even need a rug. True, in light of the specially protected status, it is quite likely that for spending the night they could get caught.

10. Twin rock of the Krasnoyarsk pillars.

11. In addition to the pine trees, the endemic fan palm grows on the tops.

12. I brought two huge cones from the mountain, the largest was 22 cm. "Especially for scientific or conservation purposes."

13. The peak of Agujas de Santa Agueda is the western one, I climbed around it for an hour (photo 4-13), after which I went along the ridge to the neighboring one. The eastern slope of the mountain is mainly asphalt-like slabs with a slope of up to 45°.

14. There are many grottoes and small caves under the peaks, but I would not stay in them for a long time, since fresh layers of broken shale lay under my feet.

15. The path along the ridge naturally leads not along the edge, but along the slabs of the eastern slope. Since the marks are partially erased, and the tours are not everywhere, in some places it is not readable and you have to either look for it or jump a lot and climb small walls.

16. At some point I just went and climbed up the slab to take a clean look around. While I was climbing, I sweated three times, counted six eyelets leading to the very edge and slipped on pine needles a couple of times (even with a broom), but still made it to the edge.

17. Panorama of Agujas de Santa Agueda and the valley.

18. “Tongue” of the slab onto which the lugs led. Perhaps a route was made on the tongue from a steep slope, when this was not yet prohibited. In the background is the eastern peak, which I didn’t have enough time for (and I was too lazy to enter this massif from below, because you can’t climb head-on). Well, we need to leave something for the future.

19. The neighboring rock and the western peak, which you can seem to reach with your hand, but in fact it’s half an hour of brisk walking.

20.

21. Glory photo!

22. With the glory photo it turned out like a classic: I climbed in, but only had to jump back with the prospect of getting stuck. We had to look for a route through the steep western slope, where there was more microrelief due to weathering and shelves through which one could access the eastern slabs. He squirmed quite a bit.

23. The main discomfort of the day for me was the lack of water. The nearest water is only in the valley, either in the form of restaurants or in the form of springs, the quality of which I have not checked (the closest one is near the “farm” from the 3rd photo, the springs appear on the map as Font). I took only 0.5, but it felt like I had to carry three times as much, because... the sun and humidity began to squeeze me out as soon as I left the shadow of the mountain.

24. Miravet Valley. The bright illuminated rock on the right is the ruins of the castle of the same name, we will also go there a day later.

25. I returned back to the car the same way, without going to the top it took an hour. In total, I spent 3.5 hours on the mountain, taking into account meditations and photos, and walked 5.1 km with a climb of 500 m.

27. A stone outcrop on the trail just below the eastern peak.

28. The road along the Miravet Valley is marked on the map as a dirt road without a number. They don't know grief!

29. Those same tangerine groves from the edge of the 5th photo.

Day 1: meeting in the city of Santader.

This relatively small but prosperous city on the Bay of Biscay is a delight to the eye. The monumental embankment, central avenues with luxurious architecture and even the largest bank in Spain with the same name Santander. After exploring the city center, we take a train or bus and go to the town of Unquera. Next, we cross a large river over a bridge and leave the province of Cantabria and enter the province of Asturias. On the other side of the Deva River appears the pretty medieval town of Bustio. Next we enter a dense eucalyptus forest. On the right, along the way, the ruins of the Tina monastery open. Here in the canyon there will be a beautiful forest waterfall. We will set up our camp near this monastery.
2 hours, 5 km

Day 2: Trekking along the ocean, swimming on the beaches.

We pass through the picturesque village of Pimiango. Next we walk parallel to the ocean coastline through picturesque meadows and forests. After a while we will come to the mouth of the river and the magnificent Playa de la Franca beach. Next we cross the Cabra River on an ancient bridge and head towards Bufones de Santiuste. This is a place where, during storms, sea water shoots up many meters. We go over rocky cliffs and spend the night near the town of Buelna.
15 km 5-6 hours

Day 3: Trekking along the ocean, access to the Sierra De La Cuesta mountains

In the morning we will walk near several unique rock formations, through huge holes in the limestone. These are truly unique places. In the town of Buelna we will make a stop and go to the town of Pendueles to buy more groceries. Next we climb up the mountain along the LLN-4 road and reach the village of Carranzo at the foot of the Sierra De La Cuesta mountains. Next we enter a narrow gorge and stop for the night in a picturesque eucalyptus-beech forest.
10 km, 4-5 hours

Day 4: Climbing to the top of Mount Coteru el Espinu on the Sierra De La Cuesta ridge

After breakfast, we leave our things at the camp and begin our climb up the mountain. The higher you go, the more picturesque. Having passed a remote farm, we begin to climb sharply up the ridge along a sheep path. The mountains become more rocky and steep. Finally we reach the top of Coteru el Espinu, from here we have a wonderful view of the endless ocean and the Picos de Europa mountain range. After enjoying the views and beauty, we go down to the camp.
9 km, 4-5 hours, elevation gain 700 m

Day 5: Return to the coast

In the morning we begin our descent into the valleys. The road is very picturesque, with copses interspersed with beautiful haciendas and meadows. We enter the valley of the Puron River and then through eucalyptus forests we descend to a picturesque parking lot on the Puron River. Here we will stop for the night. 11 km, 5-6 hours

Day 6: Walking along the coast to the town of Llanes and then to Po Beach

Today we are walking along the ocean again. Along the way we will visit the beautiful beaches of the Bay of Biscay. From the observation deck of La Boriza we will enjoy views of the ocean, coast and mountains of the Cierra De La Cuesta. After lunch, after passing through several cute towns, we will go to the city of Llanes. We will devote several hours to exploring this pretty ancient town. Having purchased more food, we will go further, about another 3 km. The city is divided by a narrow sea bay - a canal, in which moored yachts and boats are pleasing to the eye. On the embankment, local artists wonderfully painted the concrete cubes of the breakwater, which became one of the attractions of Ljanes. On the edge of the huge Po beach, sandwiched between high rocks, we will set up camp the next morning. Overnight at a campsite near the ocean.
Distance 14 km 5-7 hours

Day 7: Radial access to the beach and islands of Playa San Martin and return to Llanes and further Santander.

In the morning, after washing lightly, we will walk along the coast, admiring the views of the sea and small islands that look like armadillos standing in the water. We will walk along Playa de Almenada and reach San Martin. The islands of Almenada and Castro San Martin delight with their views. Today is a very busy sea day. Returning to the camp we go to Po station or Llanes. In the evening we reach Santander. Where you can spend the night in scarves near the airport at a campsite or in the city in a hostel.
8-10 km, 4-5 hours

Day 8: Inspection of the city of Santander and departure or transfer to Madrid.

Today our wonderful and eventful journey along the Bay of Biscay of the Atlantic Ocean comes to an end. In the morning we explore Santander and fly off to wherever. From here you can go to Barcelona, Bilbao or Madrid by bus or train

– a paradise for hikers, travelers seeking a variety of landscapes and the tranquility of the surrounding nature. In addition, trekking - hiking over rough terrain - in Spain is complemented by pleasant weather during almost all twelve months. Whatever path you are looking for: long hiking trails, unique or universal routes, very simple or “authentic” ones in complete fusion with nature, you will certainly find your way in Spain.

The entire Mediterranean coastline is an excellent choice for hiking. You can explore Andalusia with its Sierra Nevada mountain range, where you can find routes of varying difficulty levels, or build a route along the coast, combining a beach holiday with active movement. This region is of great ecological interest: during trekking you can encounter quiet, untouched natural places, observe animals and birds and admire landscapes with countless shades of green. If you choose the Murcia region, you will enjoy a typical rural landscape with an abundance of orchards and flower-filled valleys. Valencia offers a landscape with an abundance of wetlands and lagoons. In addition, the famous Via Augusta path is laid along the entire Mediterranean coast, following which you will touch the history of the advance of the Roman Empire through the territory of Spain.

Another original and fun way to make your way around the peninsula and get to know it better is to take the so-called “Green Paths”. The fact is that in Spain there are more than 2,000 kilometers of abandoned railway infrastructure. Thanks to an ingenious initiative, these old railway tracks have been restored, but the tracks have been removed so that cyclists and pedestrians can travel along these tracks to explore the local scenery.

Explore the islands of Spain on foot

Hiking opportunities in Spain are not limited to the peninsula. The islands are also looking forward to visiting you. For example, going on a hike through the Canary Islands is one of the best ways to observe the center of natural contrasts: lush forests, plains, volcanoes, steep cliffs, sand dunes and jungle thickets. Many routes pass through a unique environment that radically changes its appearance within a couple of kilometers. The Balearic Islands are famous for their fantastic countryside and stunning coastal routes.

Help finding routes

Have you already thought of your route? If not, we invite you to find out more information about hiking trails and routes in Spain. Many regions of Spain have their own mountain and hiking associations. Their web pages provide detailed information about routes, overnight accommodations and attractions in the region. It should be noted that all information on these sites is most often presented only in Spanish.

Spain is a colorful, cheerful country that attracts the interest not only of those who love the sun, beaches and skiing activities. Spain, being one of the highest countries in Europe—mountains here occupy most of the country—is interesting for its landscape and for those who love a hiking format of travel and are interested in mountain hiking and trekking.

The Canary Islands are a unique region of volcanic origin - there are more than six hundred volcanoes, and the Teide volcano on the island of Tenerife is the highest point in the country. Its height is 3718m. You can also find absolutely unique vegetation here, the representatives of which do not grow anywhere else except this island.

Documentation:

To visit Spain you need a Schengen visa. Also, to carry out trekking in Tenerife, you need to obtain special permission from the local authorities, so applications for participation in the trek stop accepting 15 days before the start date of the event.
Each participant of the trip must be insured! Since insurance is not included in the price of the trip, you will need to insure yourself before leaving. We strongly recommend that you do not skimp on insurance and choose a program that covers activities such as trekking and mountaineering, and also does not have a deductible for any type of evacuation if necessary.

It might be useful to read: