Area: Puerto de San Gloria, Leon
The boundary of Green Spain and stereotypical 'yellow' Spain (not its formal title!) is essentially this range of hills, spanning the ridgeline along the Puerto de San Gloria, which marks the border between Cantabria and Leon. I vividly remember driving to Leon from Asturias in 2000 and descending into the baked valleys of the south. Today, we had a classic illustration of this extraordinary geographical and climatic boundary, as we set off from Fuente De in drizzle and mist, climbing up for miles towards the Puerto de San Gloria. It was dank and cool at the top of the pass, a stiff breeze blowing, but we thought it would be nice to take in one of the peaks on this most important of watersheds. Coriscao was too far in the conditions, so we opted to run up Pico de la Devesa instead. This worked well, straight up a fire track initially, which gave way to tangled maquis and a steep rise before a final spire of conglomerate which gave a brief scramble to a little summit cairn. The mist never quite cleared enough for us to realise we were possibly on the wrong peak (Pena de la Nava, perhaps, all the map was unclear), although it did break up spectacularly as we descended. This revealed some wild valleys, like the Portillo del Boqueron, to the east. Green Spain stayed in the mist and drizzle as we descended and then, rapidly, the yellow valleys of Leon became sun-drenched and baked as the cloud dissolved.
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