Laguna Negra

The Laguna Negra lies at about 1,700 metres in the Sierra de Urbion, a small lake of glacial origin held in a cirque with a granite wall rising two hundred metres directly behind it and Scots pine forest below. Its dark water, from depth and the surrounding rock, gives it the name, and local legend held it to be bottomless with an underground connection to the sea. Antonio Machado used it in his long poem La Tierra de Alvargonzalez, a story of parricide set here, which fixed it in Spanish literature. A path climbs from the lake to the smaller lagoons of Urbion and to the source of the Duero. In high season a shuttle bus replaces private cars on the final road.

What you actually see

• The dark lake - a small glacial pool under a granite cirque wall.
• The cirque cliff - a two-hundred-metre rock wall directly behind.
• The pine forest - Scots pine covering the slopes below.
• The upper lagoons - a path continuing to the Urbion lakes and the Duero source.

When to go

May to October; the road is often snowbound in winter and the shuttle operates from spring to autumn. Autumn colour in the surrounding woods is good. Summer weekends bring crowds and the shuttle queues.

Honest expectations

The final road closes to cars in high season and a paid shuttle runs instead, which surprises visitors. The lake itself is small and the walk from the car park short, so it works better combined with the longer routes above.

Nearby

Vinuesa and the Urbion pine forests surround it; Soria and the Rio Lobos canyon lie southeast.