Just outside the tiny hamlet of Castro, on the road alongside the Rio Somiedo river, there are signs warning of bears crossing. I spot a big, black, wild boar scrabbling up the bank and disappearing into the undergrowth. We park up at the edge of Castro and, in the warm sunshine, climb up and along a path skirting a limestone cliff with views of the heavily forested cliff on the other side of the gorge. It’s now very warm and I’m not in the mood to walk far. I tell Jo that she should walk on. ‘I’ll sit on this rock in the dappled shade and wait for you to return.’ It’s a delightful wait. There are birds of prey circling high overhead and many small rodents foraging on the path’s edge. I pick a small bunch of wild flowers which I present to Jo when she returns, and we steadily descend back to the river.
Having seen the boar, the birds and the rodents, I’m alert to other possible animal sightings. When we are almost down at the river I glance up to the hill across from us where I can see movement in a forest clearing. I point with my trekking pole. ‘Look.’ I say to Jo, ‘What’s that moving across the scree up there? It looks quite big.’ Without hesitation Jo says, ’It’s a goat.’ Typically, I’ve left my binoculars in the van but we’re close enough to see that it’s a very big lumbering animal. Then Jo says, ‘It’s a bear. 100% that’s a bear.’ ‘Yes.’ I say gleefully, ‘That’s a bear for sure.’ It’s an adult brown bear – a Cantabrian Brown Bear. This is unbelievable good fortune. In a vast 2,000 sq.km region of Northern Spain there are only about 300 Cantabrian brown bears in the wild, and they’re shy creatures, spending most of their time living and feeding in the safety of the forest. This bear is moving across a narrow clearing from one forested area to another.
A few minutes earlier or later and we would have missed it. Jo now has her zoom camera focused on it and she declares excitedly. ‘My God, baby bears.’ I see them, about ten metres behind their mother, padding one after the other towards the trees. Mother stops, glances back briefly to check on them and disappears into the forest, quickly followed by her cubs. We’re both excited: all laughter, smiles and high fives. I have always wanted to see a European brown bear in the wild and to see three of them (a Goldilocks moment!) unexpectedly is a great thrill. I descend to the van to retrieve my binoculars but the moment has passed. The bears are back in the forest. We won’t see them again.
We park for a couple of nights at Mena de Babia next to a stretch of the river Luna that has been dammed to create a large swimming pool. It’s a lovely location with a cool mountain breeze in the evenings. But the river water is freezing. In the nearby village of Cabrillanes, home to many nesting storks, there’s a friendly café where we buy fresh bread and drink good coffee in the mornings
We drive the steep ascent to the Alto de la Farrapona car park, 1,700 metres above sea level, where there are a number of trails through the mountains to four glacial lakes, the Saliencia Lakes. Jo maps out a three hour, five mile circular trek. It’s late June and the hills are carpeted with millions of many coloured wild flowers, great bunches of them cascading over the rocks and bordering the path. The views are stunning, the lakes azure blue in the afternoon sun. We spot Red Billed Choughs, Water Pipits and Greater Whitethroats. There’s almost nobody around and it’s warm so we strip naked on the shore of the biggest lake Calabazosa o Negro, and go for a swim.
Back at the van I check my legs to discover that, for the second time on this trip, I’ve been bitten by a tick. Jo has the right tool (a kind of credit card with grooves) and the enthusiasm to remove it.
We pay one final visit to the Picos before driving east to Rioja, San Sebastian and back into France. Near Poncebos is a funicular railway up to the picturesque mountain village of Bulnes. We take the expensive (17 euros each one way) seven minute train ride up the inside of the mountain for 2km and enjoy lunch and white wine in the pleasant sunny garden of a village café, after which, being properly alcohol fuelled, we bounce back down the rocky mountain path, under brooding skies, to Poncebos.
