TRAIL RIDE IN ANDALUSIA
INDICATIVE ITINERARY *
Day 1: Day 1: Arrival for your Andalusia horseback riding trip to Granada. Transfer to your hotel in Cogollos de Guadix. Welcome, presentation of your ride, aperitif with local tapas and dinner.
Day 2: Day 2: Lugros - Sendero de los pastores - La Pantaneta - Lugros.
After a good breakfast, you head to the equestrian facilities to get to meet the horses (15 min transfer). You set off on an easy path, with a magnificent view of the high plateau (1200 meters above sea level): “the shepherds' path” which crosses thick pine forests. The thickness of these forests, the silence of the path and the tranquility of the environment allow you to discover the almost magical nature of this forest. You arrive at La Pantaneta: a small lake surrounded by mountains that was formed with the melting snow of Sierra Nevada. Here you take your hearty picnic based on local products. The bravest can take a cool bath in the lake ! In the afternoon, you return to Lugros to leave the horses there and return to your hotel in Cogollos de Guadix for dinner and a night's rest.
Day 3: Lugros - Camarate - Jerez del Marquesado.
After breakfast, you drive to the horses (15 min). Today you enjoy the gentleness of the mountains with easy trails, long used for the movement of cattle: cows and “toros bravos” to the green meadows of the high mountains, “El Camarate”. It is a special place that mixes vast meadows with trees of Atlantic origin, called “the enchanted forest” because it seems that one can feel the presence of gnomes or fairies there. Around noon, you reach 2000 meters of altitude to take the picnic out of the saddlebags. Then you descend to the small town of Jerez del Marquesado. Dinner and overnight at the hotel.
Day 4: Day 4: Jerez del Marquesado - Sendero del Avión.
After breakfast, you cross the white streets of Jerez del Marquesado to head towards the “Picón”, one of the highest mountains of the Sierra Nevada (3090m) although remaining at 2000m above sea level. You walk along small streams and waterfalls of water from mountains to eternal snow. You follow the same path that a group of young people from Jerez traveled in 1960, to rescue American soldiers who crashed their plane on the peaks of Picón. You take your picnic next to the La Tizná stream. Then you return to your hotel for dinner and overnight.
Day 5: Jerez del Marquesado - Mines of Alquife - La Calahorra.
After breakfast, today you leave towards the East, crossing the immense plain called "the Altiplano of the Sierra Nevada", which allows you to do the longest gallops of the whole week: its wide paths clay are comfortable for horses. In the middle of the plateau, you reach a red mountain that surrounds the iron mines of Alquife, in operation since the time of the Bronze Age (from 3300 BC to 1200 BC). After the picnic, you ride along La Rosandrá stream, heading towards La Calahorra where the last medieval castle built in Spain before the Renaissance awaits you. Night at the hotel in La Calahorra.
Day 6: La Calahorra – Valle del Zalabí – Lugros.
After breakfast, you descend from the Altiplano (1200 m) towards the Zalabí valley through a green landscape, surrounded by cultivated fields. In another era (Andalusí), these fields were used to cultivate mulberry trees to feed the silkworms necessary for the manufacture of the tunics of the sultans". You take the picnic at La Tejea: a source of natural water of origin Arabic that emerges directly from the ground. Then you return to Lugros to leave the horses there, and get off in Guadix (15 minutes), to enjoy the many famous tapa bars in Andalucia and the delicious local food and wine at the hotel located in the old center, where you spend the last two nights.
Day 7: Lugros – Fin del Mundo – Lugros.
On the last day of your ride, you will discover, without a doubt, one of the most spectacular spaces in the Sierra Nevada: “El Fin del Mundo”: this valley of red clay, similar to the Grand Canyon, was formed in the Quaternary with the melting of the snows of the Sierra Nevada, and shelters in its walls the concentration of troglodyte dwellings the most important in the world. Still more than 4000 people live there. The picnic awaits you, surrounded by this spectacular landscape. You return in the afternoon to the Lugros equestrian facilities where you say goodbye to your horse. You then leave for Guadix by car (15min). In this picturesque town, you visit the troglodyte district and, in the evening, have dinner with the option of an authentic flamenco show.
Day 8: End after breakfast. Possible transfer to Granada. We suggest you to extend your stay and explore Granada city and the Alhambra. Ask to your guide to book entries for the visit.
* Indicative itinerary that may be changed if necessary.
