Ibon de Piedrafita is in a beautiful spot under the cliffs of the Sierra de Partacua and yesterday I headed up there with Berute – a friend from the village. In summer this is a really popular walk with guests on our walking holidays but I’d never seen it completly iced up like this. It looked really beautiful and the meadows that are filled with flowers in the summer felt quite wild covered in snow.

Birute walking under the cliffs of the Sierra de Partacua

The scale of the cliffs above is hard to visualise but when you think that the highest montain in England – Scafell Pike – could be put on top of the lake and it wouldn’t reach the top of the cliffs it puts it into some perspective!

After a really warm spell over Christmas and New Year the weather was changing and it was quite cold out. I was a bit taken by surprise how hard and icy the snow was.

Fossilised shells - at least 40 million years old!

There is a prominent rock on the route that I find fascinating. A section has sheared off in one place revealing fossilised sea shells – since the Pyrenees last rose from the sea 40 to 50 million years ago these are some pretty old shells!

Dark clouds building overhead

As forecasted the clouds built during the day and we had a few snow flurries. By the time we got back to the car the snow had started to fall fairly hard and there was a big fall overnight. Not a long day out but a good one – this walk has great views over the Valle de Tena right from the off.

Looking over the Valle de Tena towards Panticosa