Unfinished business ahead. Due to last week’s slip up half of stage 5 remained uncompleted. I’d only got halfway along the Montes Aquilianos range and Pico La Guiana remained “unbagged”. Until today.
I was reluctant to trudge up the Mare’s Seat for the third time so I decided to attack from the other side. This means taking a forgotten road to nowhere from Ponferrada up to the evocatively named “Campo de las Danzas” (field of dances) so named for being the location of all sorts of jolly pre-Christian pagan festivities. It would have been a great place for a rave had the M25 been a bit nearer. But as it were, the field of dances lies at the end of a long and winding road which progressively crumbles into a stony track before stopping abruptly in the pre-mentioned field. It has all the hallmarks of a totally pointless road that was probably never finished. It’s useful for me today however as it gives access to the eastern end of the Aquilianos.
Drove up at a snail’s pace dodging potholes and parked on the grass. The only signs of festivities were lumps of soil where the boars had been sharpening their tusks. Strapped a small rucksack to my back and set off. To avoid any unnecessary climbing I skirted around the base of La Guiana and when the One Eye came in view I’m sure it winked at me. Marched briskly, jogged very occasionally when the gradient permitted and an hour and a half after leaving the car I was ready to resume stage 5 and make inroads into stage 6.
I could now see the outstanding views that the mist had denied me last week. Peñalba and Montes were specks in the distance and surprising quantities of snow resisted in the recesses of the glacial valleys. Tiptoed down the first steep section of descent which I should have taken last Sunday and crossed a lingering snowfield the size of a football pitch, conscious that it may well be the last I run through this season. There’s the semblance of a path and the occasional red-topped stick from last year’s event but for much of the way the reference point is the La Guiana peak that rears up directly in front of me. Felt good; performed some dainty footwork over loose slate and stone and started to feel like some Lakeland geezer from Feet in the Clouds when suddenly, my rucksack broke. I’d pulled at the strap and it just snapped. This reminded me that another good reason for the dress rehearsal is to try out materials. Experimenting with trainers, rucksack…figs even, can help prevent mishaps on the big day. Sat down for the obligatory makeshift repair job before carrying on.
La Guiana is a peak which deceives. It lies separate from the other 3 peaks and from Ponferrada it looks to be the highest. It’s not. It’s nearly 1000 feet lower than The Mare’s Seat. It also looks like a real mountain with its splendid pyramidal shape and pointy top. Closer inspection will reveal that there’s a track which will easily get you up in a 4 by 4. Once I saw a battered old Seat parked on the summit. Even La Guiana’s ruinous mountain top hermitage is phoney. It looks ages old and once again there are the familiar alpha and omega symbols to suggest further Visigoth or Mozarabe treasures await us. Wrong again! Within the ruins are chunks of concrete and bits of metal which even Saint Fructuoso’s couldn’t have conjured up in the 7th century.
The devastating effects of last year’s forest fires were visible to my left and where last year we trooped up a scenic little path, now it’s a faster but steeper and less attractive march along one of the many new firebreaks. It’s reassuring to think that one day the mountain will eventually reclaim what is rightfully hers and it’ll all be covered with vegetation again. Crowned La Guiana, briefly paid my respects to the hermitage and then slipped and slid down another firebreak on the north-western edge, Ponferrada and the chimneys of its power station now visible in the hazy basin of Bierzo far below.
And so ends the wildest, most adventurous section of the Aquilianos route (that's stages 4 and 5, from Peñalba to La Guiana). Soon I’m running through pine plantations along wide forest tracks more akin to trail running than to British style fell running. From the One Eye to Pico La Guiana it had taken me 42 minutes whilst from the summit back to the Field of Dances it was a far more comfortable 24 minutes of downhill joy. When I glanced back to take one last photo La Guiana looked majestic and inaccessible in the early morning sunlight, “phoney to the last”.
Stage 5.2 and 6.1
Approx. distance; 7 km
Time taken; 66 minutes.
Total ascent; 200 m
Total descent; 800 m
(The total route distance out and back was 14km with 850m ascent and descent…according to my map).
Ran about 50% of it, if you can call it running. Mine was a stuttering tiptoeing descent which was ridiculously slow compared to real fell runners but I felt secure and my ankles held out so I shouldn’t really complain.
Only two and a half stages left and the next one is a continuation of the same forest trail to the abandoned village of Ferradillo. Maybe I can wangle a very early Wednesday morning run…
Travesía Integral de los Montes Aquiianos
