Located in the eastern part of the Sierra, in the basin of the Rio Vero, Barranco Lumos is a torrential canyon, often dry but with a few potholes of rainwater. The descent includes a number of tricky sections, in particular opposing, sometimes quite exposed, rock faces. Not an easy route, it's a real beauty, traversing a huge fissure carved out of conglomerate in the middle of nowhere. After a series of beautiful steep abseils to reach the bottom, there's a long passage of estrechos and oscuros where you have to sneak up sometimes in profile, ending with a pretty abseil that seems to take you out, but it's not over yet... The rest is long, with many difficult sections. In the end, it's a 1st category barranco, challenging, wild and sustained in its effort and difficulties.
Technical summary
Location ✦ Colungo
Region ✦ Sierra de Guara, Aragon
Country ✦ Spain
Type ✦ Torrential canyon
Vertical rise ✦ 160m
Difficulty ✦ v3-a1-II
Max abseiling ✦ 20m
Duration ✦ 4h30 to 5h
Distance ✦ 1800m
Access to the place
From Colungo, take the A-2205 road north towards Lecina. After passing above Asque, the road makes a large hairpin bend and heads due north. You switch from east to west at the Col de Caprasio. Between km 21 and 22, on the flat part of the ridge, there's an obvious parking area on the left.
Itinerary description
Hiking to the start 30'
Follow the path which heads south along the road (obvious). After a few dozen metres, before starting to climb, turn right onto the path (kairn). You soon come out above the head of the barranco, but the entrance is not there. You have to follow the path to the left, staying at altitude, to reach after at least 15′ a fairly wide entrance gully with whitish traces of the water's passage. Descend this funnel to find the1st abseil in a hole at the end.
Course 2h30 à 3h
The canyon can be broken down into 3 parts:
1st part
A series of 4 abseils (20m, 4m, 10m and then 15m) are the starting point for landing at the bottom of the canyon.
Part 2
After a wooded passage, we reach the oscuros and a very narrow passage! There are a number of basins to enter, some tricky de-climbing, a 4m abseil and then a slight bend to the right. There's an interior room and then it continues with some "subexcavados" passages. We finish on a pretty abseil that takes us "out" among the rocks.
Part 3
It's still a long way to go, and if you think you're done, you're not! There's another big series of oppositions and jumps to negotiate, some of them really tricky, but you can often get around them by climbing a little to the right before finding a passage back to the bed. There's another abseil 8m further on and another series of jumps before the terrain becomes easier. It's opening up a little now and you can make out the finish on the left of the Alpàn barranco, a sign that we're nearly finished. Continue through the woods and finally enter the S-shaped limestone defile that marks the end of hostilities.
Back
Enter the wide, overgrown opening and, after the limestone defile, look really far right through the foliage for the start of the return path. There's a cairn and the path heads off in the opposite direction. We quickly climb back up to pass a small pass and walk along the ridge with the Lumos below on the right. Follow this obvious path to the end to find the road and parking lot.
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