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Cave of la Covaciella

Cabrales, Oriente, Asturias

1 Villages · 2 Nature · 3 Activities · 1 Curiosities

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Cave of la Covaciella

Nature · Cabrales, Oriente, Asturias

The Covaciella cave opens in the Las Estazadas area, in the Asturian municipality of Cabrales. It was discovered in October 1994 when a blast went off during road works; after a forty-metre gallery, a chamber is reached with paintings of bison from the Magdalenian period, around 14,000 years old, magnificently preserved thanks to their late discovery. Since 2008 it has formed part of the group Cave of Altamira and Palaeolithic cave art of the Cantabrian coast, inscribed on the Unesco World Heritage list. Declared a Bien de Interés Cultural (Spain's highest level of heritage protection), it remains closed to the public so as not to disturb its delicate environmental balance; a reproduction can be seen at the Casa Bárcena in Carreña, the municipality's capital.

Photo: José Manuel Benito (Public domain)

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