Asturias: The Part of Spain That Refuses to Stop Raining (and Why That’s the Point)

While most of Spain bakes in summer and fights the reputation of a country defined by beaches and heat, Asturias goes its own way. The region produces 80% of all cider in Spain, has more kilometres of hiking trail than most people will manage in a lifetime, and looks, frankly, nothing like what people mean when they say “Spain.” Drive the coastal road between Gijón and Llanes on a morning when the Atlantic mist is still sitting in the river valleys and you’ll understand the local pride. This is the north, and it knows it.

The Picos de Europa

The Picos de Europa National Park straddles the border between Asturias, Cantabria, and Castile and León, and if you have one day with a car and the park’s map, the Ruta del Cares is where to spend it. This 22-kilometre gorge trail cuts through limestone cliffs along the Cares River, and the path is mostly blasted from the rock face itself. It’s not a scramble, but the exposure is real enough to hold your attention. Go in May or early June, before the July crowds arrive and the parking areas fill.

The cable car at Fuente Dé lifts you from the valley floor to 1,850 metres in four minutes. From the top, the views of the Picos ridgeline and the valley below are the best of the park without a multi-hour climb. The downside: on a clear summer day the queue at the bottom runs 90 minutes. Get there at opening or accept that timing.

The village of Cangas de Onís is the practical base for the park, with a good range of accommodation and the famous pre-Romanesque chapel of Santa Cueva just outside town. The Cabrales area to the east is famous for its blue cheese, which is aged in mountain caves at humidity and temperatures that apparently no other region of Spain can replicate. Whether that’s marketing or genuine terroir is debatable, but the cheese is very good.

Coastline and Villages

The Asturian coast has a different personality from any other part of Spain’s shoreline. Cudillero is the most photographed: a fishing village of painted houses stacked in tiers around a small harbour, the streets climbing so steeply that walking between levels sometimes involves going indoors and out again. It’s best on a weekday morning before the tour buses from Oviedo arrive.

Playa del Silencio near Cudillero has the dramatic sea arches the region is known for and is consistently rated one of the most beautiful beaches in Spain by people who have been to both. The access path from the car park is steep enough to deter the casual visitor, which is part of why it stays relatively quiet.

Llanes further east combines genuine medieval architecture with 14 beaches within easy distance. The painted concrete cubes of the harbour, an outdoor artwork that divides opinion, are as worth seeing as anything more traditional in the town.

Where to Eat

Asturian food is not delicate. Fabada asturiana is the signature dish: a stew of large white fabes beans with chorizo, morcilla, and cured pork, slow-cooked until the beans absorb the fat of everything around them. It’s served everywhere in the region, ranging from forgettable to exceptional; the best versions come from restaurants where it is the only reason you walked in.

For something lighter, the seafood along the coast is excellent. Hake, barnacles, sea urchin, and spider crab all appear on menus from Ribadesella to Luarca, and the combination of Atlantic proximity and relative tourist obscurity keeps the quality high.

The sidrerías deserve their own visit. Asturian cider is poured from height, the bottle held above the head and the glass at hip level, to aerate the cider before the single serving. You drink it quickly and pour the next one. The ritual is part of the point. Oviedo and Gijón both have concentrated areas of sidrerías on their old-town streets where this is the dominant evening activity from about 9pm onward.

Where to Stay

Oviedo is the capital and has a genuine historic centre around its cathedral and the adjacent pre-Romanesque churches of Santa María del Naranco and San Miguel de Lillo, which predate the Romanesque period by three centuries. Hotel options in the centre range from budget to four-star, with the area around the Calle Uría well-connected and walkable.

Cangas de Onís is the better base for the Picos if that’s your priority. Small hotels and casas rurales cluster in and around the town, and prices are lower than in Oviedo.

For something different, Asturias has a 2026 Rural Tourism Voucher scheme where you pay 75 euros and get 150 euros’ worth of accommodation credit, usable across more than 350 rural properties throughout the region until December. It’s worth looking into before you book if you’re planning more than a couple of nights outside the cities.

Getting Around

You need a car. Bus connections between towns exist but are slow and infrequent enough to make a meaningful visit to the coast and the mountains impossible without your own transport. The main road from Oviedo to the coast runs smoothly; the mountain roads into the Picos are narrow and winding and take longer than the map suggests.

The regional airport at Asturias (OVD) has direct flights from several European cities and connects to Madrid. Getting here from Madrid by train takes about four hours on the direct service through the mountain tunnel.

Practical Notes

Rain is a real possibility in any month, including summer. The Atlantic climate that makes the meadows green also keeps waterproofs relevant year-round. Bring layers and an outer shell regardless of the forecast.

The Asturian interior is noticeably cooler than Spain’s meseta and coasts in summer, which makes it particularly good in July and August when other Spanish destinations are punishing. The season extends well into September, when the cider harvest begins and the mountain colours shift toward rust and gold.

July and August are the busiest months. If you have any flexibility, early September or late May gives you the same access to everything with considerably less company on the trails and at the beaches.