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The
mountain range and valleys of the Pyrenees are the biggest tourist
resource in Aragón and one of the main ones of the Peninsula. A
great natural and forest reservation, with summits of more than
3000 meters, the Pyrenees are an ideal place for practising skiing,
adventure sports and other activities related to tourism in the
mountains.
The areas of the National Park of Ordesa and the Natural Parks
of Guara and Posets-Maladeta are particularly interesting, as
well as the Aragonese part of the pilgrimage route to Santiago,
which enters Spain through the mountain port of Somport, descends
to Canfranc on its way to the valley of the river Aragón, where
it reaches Jaca (the town where the earliest Romanesque cathedral
of Spain is found) and continues until it meets with the route
of Roncesvalles in Puente la Reina de Jaca.
The Muslims were stopped by Carlomagno (Charles the Great) in
the Pyrenees and here the Christian Kingdoms were born, small
kingdoms from which the Reconquest would arise after 800 years
of fighting to expel the Moorish Kingdom from the peninsula. A
great legacy of numerous historical remains is left in the Pyrenees:
castles, hermitages, churches and strong towers are reminders
of this epic time of frontier wars.
An excellent railcar links Zaragoza with Huesca and northwards.
The highways to the main valleys are generally in good state.
The tunnel by lorry through the Somport, which is under construction
at the moment, will dramatically speed up the communications with
France.
In
Huesca the inadequacy of agriculture as an economic resource has
caused the population to concentrate in the main towns of the
province, and to abandon their original villages, except in the
valleys of the north, which have adapted to the new mountain tourism.
Huesca provincial capital has about 50.000 inhabitants, it is
the most industrial city in the county and it agglomerates most
of the political and administrative institutions.
Jaca
is one of the main cities of the Pyrenees, with good communications
and with an important artistic heritage. Fraga, which stands by
the course of the river Cinca is a town of Roman origin, erected
by the ancient road that used to connect Lérida and Celsa. Barbastro
is the capital of the district of the Somontano, origin of the
wine industry of the same name.
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