I've just recently moved to a new city with new exploring possibilites all around, so to get familiar with my new surroundings, one warm (too warm!) winter morning I headed to Can Palomeres, a hill dotted with mines aaall around. The views from up there are quite nice...Seaside and mines, what more could you ask for?
On a previous visit with my exploring partner we only explored the biggest mine in the hill, of which you can read a report and the history of the area here:
Report - - The Big Mine of 'Can Palomeres' (Abandoned Iron Mine) - Spain (December 2023) | European and International Sites
But there's a lot of stuff to see in the area, these 2 maps show the whole extense of the underground workings in the hill:
Having this playground 5 minutes from home has had me biting my nails for the last weeks, so today I said 'fuck it' and went solo. It was hard to keep my head cool and skip the sketchiest bits, motivation and adrenaline were running high, this being the first time underground on my own. Still, I managed to see most of the mines, so here we go!
Most of the most well known adits don't have much interest since they're just a straight tunnel, but this one had some fun surprises awaiting.
This is the typical look of the galleries in all the complex. They're lined with chalk because they were used as mushroom farms in the 60's.
After taking a turn I could feel a draft of air, and after a bit of a squeeze through a sketchier part, I reached the bottom of a small shaft that led to the surface.
It was easily climbable but after poking my head out decided to retrace my steps to the original entrance to not lose orientation in the forest.
That one was well hidden and took a while to find, but it also had a surprise waiting inside.
This gallery had no graffitti and even had some walls of stacked deads still remaining, and at the very end there were the remains of an old motorbike (?)
Now it was time to explore the upper adits in the hill. Being the closest ones to the surface, they are the most unstable ones so I had to tread more carefully there.
This was a ventilation shaft for the big mine. Funnily, I recognised it from having been down there, looking up at it from deep inside the big mine.
The next adit was fuuuull of roots hanging from the ceiling, and you could see some fresh collapses on the floor so I didn't stay on that one for too long.
At this point I had been trotting up and down that hill and going in and out of the earth for a few hours, but still had the second biggest mine of the group to see.
This one was a bit like a maze, at times I could feel my heart rate going up a bit, but in the end it was good fun to manage to do it alone for once.
This was also the mine with the most 'features' like ore chutes, some nails on the walls...no rails anywhere sadly.
It was quite a big mine, with galleries and crossroads in every direction.
At some point you reach this rope that leads you up to more levels. I managed to get to the middle one but it was just a very short gallery...the climb up the rope didn't seem like the most safe thing to do by myself, so at this point, feeling more than satisfied, I went back to the surface and back to the seaside.
On a previous visit with my exploring partner we only explored the biggest mine in the hill, of which you can read a report and the history of the area here:
Report - - The Big Mine of 'Can Palomeres' (Abandoned Iron Mine) - Spain (December 2023) | European and International Sites
But there's a lot of stuff to see in the area, these 2 maps show the whole extense of the underground workings in the hill:
Having this playground 5 minutes from home has had me biting my nails for the last weeks, so today I said 'fuck it' and went solo. It was hard to keep my head cool and skip the sketchiest bits, motivation and adrenaline were running high, this being the first time underground on my own. Still, I managed to see most of the mines, so here we go!
Most of the most well known adits don't have much interest since they're just a straight tunnel, but this one had some fun surprises awaiting.
This is the typical look of the galleries in all the complex. They're lined with chalk because they were used as mushroom farms in the 60's.
After taking a turn I could feel a draft of air, and after a bit of a squeeze through a sketchier part, I reached the bottom of a small shaft that led to the surface.
It was easily climbable but after poking my head out decided to retrace my steps to the original entrance to not lose orientation in the forest.
That one was well hidden and took a while to find, but it also had a surprise waiting inside.
This gallery had no graffitti and even had some walls of stacked deads still remaining, and at the very end there were the remains of an old motorbike (?)
Now it was time to explore the upper adits in the hill. Being the closest ones to the surface, they are the most unstable ones so I had to tread more carefully there.
This was a ventilation shaft for the big mine. Funnily, I recognised it from having been down there, looking up at it from deep inside the big mine.
The next adit was fuuuull of roots hanging from the ceiling, and you could see some fresh collapses on the floor so I didn't stay on that one for too long.
At this point I had been trotting up and down that hill and going in and out of the earth for a few hours, but still had the second biggest mine of the group to see.
This one was a bit like a maze, at times I could feel my heart rate going up a bit, but in the end it was good fun to manage to do it alone for once.
This was also the mine with the most 'features' like ore chutes, some nails on the walls...no rails anywhere sadly.
It was quite a big mine, with galleries and crossroads in every direction.
At some point you reach this rope that leads you up to more levels. I managed to get to the middle one but it was just a very short gallery...the climb up the rope didn't seem like the most safe thing to do by myself, so at this point, feeling more than satisfied, I went back to the surface and back to the seaside.
