Extremadura, which means "beyond the Duero", is located in the south-west of Spain, on the border with Portugal. It borders Andalusia to the south, Castile-Leon to the north and Castile-La Mancha to the east. Only one million people live in this sparsely populated region, which is the size of Switzerland. A large part of the landscape is taken up by the "dehesas", extensive pastures overgrown with gnarled holm oaks. They are interspersed with mountain ranges - to the north of Guadalupe is the rugged Sierra de las Villuercas, up to 1,600 metres high, and far to the north, some peaks of the Sierra do Gredos rise over 2,000 metres into the sky.
At times, Extremadura is as flat as a pancake, at others it is undulating or at most hilly. We have chosen two locations in the mountainous north, Guadalupe and Plasencia, where a 100-kilometre tour involves 1,000 to 2,000 metres of climbing. But on the routes we recommend, you are spared any brutal ramps, with no gradients of more than twelve per cent. The smaller regional roads are mostly well tarmaced, with only a few bumpy sections. Even on the larger country roads, there is usually little traffic.
You can download the entire travel article with these tours and the GPS data below:
- Tour 1: First category (114 km, 1,900 m elevation gain, max. 12 per cent gradient)
- Tour 2: Among vultures (86 km, 980 m elevation gain, max. 11 per cent gradient)
- Tour 3: Sierra de las Villuercas (102 km, 1,700 m elevation gain, max. 11 per cent gradient)
- Tour 4: Sierra and Dehesa (128 km, 1,900 m elevation gain, max. 11 per cent gradient)
