Cicerone Guides: The Mountains of Central Spain

About this book

Walks and scrambles in the Sierras de Gredos and Guadarrama which rise to 2600m, and are snow-capped for five months of the year.

Contents

List of Routes Part One - Introduction THE CENTRAL MOUNTAINS Chapter One - Background Geology and Landforms Climate and Weather Vegetation Wildlife The Human Landscape Mountaineering Rock Climbing Skiing Other Activities Chapter Two - Practical Information Part Two - The Sierra de Gredos INTRODUCTION Chapter Three - The Sierra de Bejar. Routes 1-4 Chapter Four - Western Gredos. Routes 5-8 Chapter Five - Central Gredos North Side - Routes 9-21 South Side - Routes 22-33 Chapter Six - Eastern Gredos. Routes 34-37 Part Three - The Sierra de Guadarrama INTRODUCTION Chapter Seven - Western Guadarrama. Routes 38-42 Chapter Eight - Central Guadarrama (West). Routes 43-49 Chapter Nine - Central Guadarrama (East). Routes 50-54 Chapter Ten - Upper Manzanares Basin. Routes 55-68 Chapter Eleven - Eastern Guadarrama. Routes 69-71 Part Four - Long Distance Routes The GR10 in Guadarrama Traverse of Central and West Gredos Glossaries

Customer Reviews

Biography

I'm a professional potter and have spent most of my spare time walking, climbing and skiing in northern England, Scotland and the Alps. In the early 1990s I moved to Madrid, and was very excited to find myself living in the foothills of the Sierra de Guadarrama, a sprawling range of mountains rising to 2400m, with a magnificent variety of walking, no guidebooks, startlingly unreliable maps and only a handful of people venturing beyond the car parks or picnic spots. Later, there was the same privileged feeling of pioneering when I explored the bigger, more isolated and altogether rougher and tougher Sierra de Gredos, two hours to the west. Well, I just had to write it all down. In the years since then, the Spanish have discovered hill-walking in a big way, so if you go now you'll find a bit less solitude and a good deal more erosion, even in Gredos. I don't want to overstate this though, you'll still have the walks more or less to yourselves mid-week and in term time.