Castile and León, Spain
Circumstances had long prevented me from being seduced again, by one of the most amazing and spectacular places in this ancient land of Arevaca, which makes the title of this post good: return to the Magic Soria.
Until relatively recent times, this brilliant and at the same time enigmatic wonder of Nature, was a practically unknown place by the world in general.
Located within the municipality of Muriel de la Fuente - precisely the name of the town comes from here - and barely six kilometers from Calatañazor - a town that preserves much of its fascinating medieval charm and where relevant Hollywood stars, such as Orson Welles Unforgettable classics were shot, of which the memorable film 'Chimes at midnight' can be cited - the source of the Abión river is popularly known as La Fuentona (the Big Fountain) or the Ojo de la Fuentona (the Eye of the Big Fountain).
Just after an old Romanesque hermitage -which makes good its dedication, 'de la Soledad' and approximately a couple of kilometers further in front of a modern construction, which acts as an Interpretation and Surveillance Center- the traveler finds himself in a decidedly environment supernatural, in which, if you are lucky enough to enjoy it alone, even if only for a short time - sometimes the saying that God helps those who gets up early is very true - you can come to the conclusion, that without the need to eat a psychedelic cupcake - censored in later versions of Carroll's story - he has, like the innocent Alice, accessed another world, where the real and the fantastic come together to provide a few minutes of congratulation to the spirit .
Unlike others in Soria, less spectacular although no less 'magical', there is no evidence that this place, whose pleasant walk passes between the singsong and extraordinarily transparent waters of the Abión River, spectacular antediluvian cliffs and fresh meadows where the inestimable prevails the shadow of the pine and fir, for the most part, there is no record, or at least I do not have it, that the great poets who sang the beauty of this land or made us shudder with their fantastic legends - let's suppose I'm talking about Antonio Machado, by Gerardo Diego or Gustavo Adolfo Bécquer- knew this extraordinary place, where the trout is the owner and mistress of the waters and where the Spanish crab -the same one, in whose destruction a governmental body, ICONA, incredibly participated by introducing into our rivers the American crab, which practically wiped out the autochthonous species - maintains a colony, far from the avid hands of the fisherman.
The name of Ojo de la Fuentona (the Eye of the Big Fountain) is not free either, since as can be appreciated, the source of the Abión river forms an almost perfect oval, with the curious effect, added, that its waters, as limpid, however, as those that can be appreciating the river ahead, they offer an extraordinarily unique aspect, because by effect of the light, reflecting the green of the vegetation and the clear blue of the skies, it gives the uncertain but wonderful sensation of being an eye, yes, but open to the sea, a circumstance that adds spectacularity to the question, if we take into account that Soria and this place are in the center of the Iberian Peninsula and therefore, hundreds of kilometers away from the nearest coast.
This accumulation of circumstances, together with the intricate and practically unknown network of underground tunnels hidden under the waters of this cyclopean eye from which according to ancient traditions, the Gods watch over the movements of men, led to the fact that in the early 1980s of the In the late 20th century, the place caught the attention of scientists and cavers, including the team from the program 'Al filo de la aventura' ('On the edge of adventure'), who recorded the only existing documentary to date.
A documentary, on the other hand, that made inside its fantastic underground world - where Nature has created spectacular cathedrals - which is known to run hundreds of kilometers underground, but of which only 3 or 4 kilometers were reached. first, being, in addition, compared or at least presented in a double program, with those other great sacred wells, which are the incredible Mexican cenotes.
NOTICE: Both the text and the accompanying photographs are my exclusive intellectual property and therefore are subject to my Copyright.
