Transportation

We flew into Valencia and had 7 days to transport ourselves and our bikes to Teruel and complete a 420 km route with 7,500 m of elevation gain. From Valencia, you can reach Teruel by train, and it’s possible to bring your bike, though there are limited bike spaces on each train. We decided to head straight to Teruel from the airport with our bikes still packed in boxes, leaving the boxes at Hotel Teruel Plaza, where we stayed on the first and last nights.

Accommodations

After our bikepacking trip in Sardinia, we realized that traveling light brings us far more joy than carrying a tent. This time, we decided to stay exclusively in hotels. This aspect required the most planning because Montañas Vacías is truly empty! In almost every town we visited, the hostel where we stayed was the only one open in the area. At the end of this blog, you’ll find a list of all the accommodations we used. If you prefer camping, Montañas Vacías is perfect for that, as it’s easy to find spots to pitch a tent or hang a hammock. Alternatively, there are refugios along the route – simple shelters located directly on the trail. If you bring a sleeping bag and mat, they work perfectly as overnight stops.

Snow in Spain?

We completed the route in early May, and down jackets definitely came in handy because the weather wasn’t typically Spanish. It was around 15–17°C, and it even snowed once! Yes, you read that right – snow in Spain during May. Despite this, I believe May, June, September, and October are the best months to tackle this route. However, remember that you’ll mostly be riding at an altitude of 1,200–1,500 m above sea level (Teruel itself is at 915 m), which means the weather changes quickly and is cooler than you might expect during a trip to Spain.

Gravel, bocadillos, and total emptiness

If we had to name three things that define Montañas Vacías, they would be: gravel highways, bocadillos in bars, and complete emptiness. While planning the trip, we were shocked and a bit intimidated to discover that 80% of the route is on gravel. We know how much time it can take to cover 60 km on gravel unless it’s perfect… and that’s exactly what the roads in Montañas Vacías are like: gravel highways that are seriously fast and smooth to ride.

Food

It’s worth carrying some backup food because you can’t always count on finding an open shop or bar. Even though Google Maps might show at least one bar in every town, it’s possible that it’s closed or has permanently shut down, as many owners have either moved away or given up due to the lack of customers. Most bars we visited were run by older people, so the future of these small establishments is uncertain. We brought snacks like energy bars, gummies, instant soups, cured sausages, a pack of pasta, and tortillas. These saved us on the third morning when we couldn’t have breakfast at a hostel because the owners had gone to take their children to school in a nearby town, likely dozens of kilometers away.