Picos de Europa

Spain's first national park and one of the pioneers in Europe, it was declared in 1918 on the personal initiative of the Marquess of Villaviciosa, Pedro Pidal, under the original name of Montaña de Covadonga. In 1995 it was widened to take in all three massifs (Asturias, Cantabria and Castile and León) and in 2014 it reached its present extent. Its name — Peaks of Europe — comes, by tradition, from its being the first land sighted by sailors returning from the Americas. Pidal himself was the first to reach the summit of the Naranjo de Bulnes, in 1904, alongside the local guide known as El Cainejo, a feat that founded sport mountaineering in Spain.