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Not even the work to enhance Malaga-province's famous Caminito del Rey suspended walkway along a gorge, which has served to revitalise inland tourism in the area, can overshadow everything that surrounds it.
The popular tourist attraction is the best known part of an area where you can also see one of the most important cave paintings in Europe. It is also the location of a revolt that, over ten centuries ago, challenged the dominance of the Umayyad Caliphate.
These notes concern the historical and natural site, which submitted its official candidacy to Unesco years ago, aspiring to become the second Malaga site with a World Heritage Site status.
In addition to the Caminito del Rey itself and its particular history, the area hosts enclaves that are of great national and even worldwide importance.
These landmarks, all located less than 20 kilometres from the famous walkway, are the Ardales cave, the necropolis of Las Aguilillas, the cave church of Bobastro and the Desfiladero de los Gaitanes gorge natural area itself.
The latter, considered one of the most spectacular gorges in the country, is intersected by the Guadalhorce river. The impressive canyon reaches a height of up to 300 metres and a width of less than 10. It paints, without a doubt, one of the best picture postcards of the province of Malaga.
The gorge's protection as a natural site is due to its extraordinary geomorphological status and the presence of interesting fauna, including the griffon vulture. This interesting ecological site, which covers an area of more than two thousand hectares, can now be visited thanks to the reopening of the Caminito del Rey.
The Ardales cave is also remarkable for its geology, but what makes it even more noteworthy are its findings. The cave, located on the outskirts of the town, is home to cave paintings from the Solutrean period, an important Neolithic site and several burials from the Chalcolithic period.
It is the only archaeological site in Malaga that has been included in the European cultural itinerary 'Caminos del Arte Rupestre' - a title it has earned thanks to the handprints created using the airbrush technique and the finger-drawn symbols, features found in only a few sites worldwide.
In the area known as Las Mesas de Villaverde, located very close to the Gaitanes gorge, you can visit another one of Malaga's great jewels: the basilica built by Omar Ben Hafsún in his bastion of Bobastro, from where he challenged the powerful Umayyad dynasty. In fact, this rock-hewn church is one of the emblems of the archaeological site. It is believed that its construction began when Hafsun embraced Christianity, which further angered Abderraman III.
Another enclave of great archaeological value - the necropolis of Las Aguilillas - is located in the municipality of Campillos. It is considered one of the most important burial sites in the province of Malaga. Like other tombs of the period, it evokes the womb of a mother. The prehistoric necropolis is located on a sandstone that rises some five hundred metres above sea level.
The Caminito del Rey's treasures include even more jewels among the four mentioned so far.
On the one hand, we have several tunnels, viaducts and the El Chorro station. In the heart of the Gaitanes gorge await very valuable enclaves within the European railway legacy, which were built in the second half of the 19th century to link Malaga (at that time the second most important industrial city in the country) with the interior of Andalucía.
There are also other more recent constructions, such as the footbridges of the Caminito del Rey, the hydroelectric jump and the El Chorro and Gaitanejo dams.
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