The Bikepacker: Bikepacking - The Cares Gorge Trail

Day #

State of Legs

:-)

	Distance (miles)	Distance (km)	Ascent (feet)	Ascent (metres)	Punctures
Today	0 miles	km	0 feet	metres	0
Trip Totals	2553 miles	km	110733 feet	metres	0

Today's Route

No cycling the route today

Route So Far

Travelogue

The plan for today was to cycle to and then hike the Cares Gorge trail in both directions and then cycle back to the campsite again. And that's what I did.

I was up quite early, hoping to start hiking before it got very busy. Cares Gorge is very popular and with good reason. But rather than the blue skies that had been forecast, I found myself looking at very low cloud once again. I thought about delaying and staying at the campsite until it was more certain we were not in for a thundery, stormy day. But I couldn't just sit around and so got on the bike and set off to cycle the approximately 5 miles from the campsite up to the start of the trail at the village of Poncebos.

Misty

There was a lot of low cloud but I could glimpse blue sky and sunlight ahead as I cycled, so despite the misty conditions, I was optimistic.

On arrival at Poncebos, I was surprised how many parked cars there were and how many people were already heading up the road to start hiking. I parked The Mule and chained them to an information sign and set off.

Following the path south to the end at Caín de Valdeón, you spend most of your time climbing. The gradient is generally quite gentle, however. The path is always wide enough for people to pass in both directions but hugs the cliffs of the gorge and is often at quite a dizzying height above the river in the gorge below.

Here's the outbound route:

My Suunto GPS watch went a bit haywire and recorded the outbound route as 8.8 miles and the return, which is the outbound route in reverse as 12.7 miles. I'd noticed it display an unusual message when I started recording the outbound walk and just thought "that's odd" and continued. The walk is supposed to be between 7 and 7.5 miles long, in fact. I've since reset the watch and it seems OK again.

The scenery along the entire trail is absolutely wonderful. It's no surprise it's regarded as the best hike in the Picos de Europa park.

Here are some photos from the outbound walk. None of them do the place justice. I made some short videos on the return walk and they're at the end of this post and conceivably help get an idea of what the place is like. To be honest, the only way to really know is to go there!

There are a few low and quite dark tunnels towards the end

Caín de Valdeón and the end of the trail in this direction

At Caín de Valdeón, I had a cold drink and ate a home made blue cheese bocadillo and rested a while before turning around and heading back along the trail the way I'd come, destined for Poncebos and hopefully, my bike!

Photos and videos from the return walk: