Cueva de la Pileta

Cave in Ronda

Entrada Pileta, Ronda — CC BY-SA 2.0 / falconaumanni

Cueva de la Pileta or Cave of the Pool is a cave in the twenty kilometers southwest of Ronda in Spain. The cave was discovered in 1905.

Torchlit guided tours, which must be booked in advance, give you access to the cave system reveal Stone Age paintings of horses, goats and fish from 20,000 to 25,000 years ago. The tours are given by English-speaking members of the Bullón family, whose great-great-grandfather discovered the paintings in 1905. The entrance you use today was only discovered in 1924.

The tour lasts about an hour.

Being limestone, the cave system was originally an underground river. In dry periods stalactites formed, while in wetter periods the system flowed with torrents of water. This is why many of the cave sides have been worn smooth by the volume of water.

What to look for Cueva de la Pileta

The are two types of cave drawings found:

Cro-Magnon man drawings, from approximately 25,000 years ago in the upper Palaeolithic period.
Levantine art drawings which look like the more common charcoal scratchings of ZigZags and stick men. Many of these are of archers hunting their prey.

The fact that the caves are so uncommercial is a real plus. Although the family is finding the upkeep a battle, they are loathe to give in to pressure from the local authorities to turn the caves over to its administration.

The Cueva de la Pileta appears in our Complete Guide to Visiting Ronda !

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