Serra dos Ancares

Serra dos Ancares is a mountain range in northwestern Spain, lying in the Ancares massif of Galicia. It is notable for its remote highland villages and well-preserved traditional architecture.

The area is primarily visited for walking and rural tourism, with networked trails across ridges, beech and oak woodlands and open mountain pastures. Small villages such as Piornedo retain traditional stone-and-thatch houses and an ethnographic museum that documents local mountain life.

The range has been shaped by centuries of pastoralism and small-scale agriculture; villages developed as isolated upland communities with local building traditions. Administrative boundaries place parts of the massif on both Galician and Castile-and-Leon sides, with land use continuity between provinces.

The Serra dos Ancares sits in the province of Lugo in Galicia near the border with León, in northwest Spain. The landscape is remote and mountainous, accessed from small towns in Galicia and neighboring Castilla y León.

• Local character: The Galician name distinguishes this sector of the larger Ancares massif and is known for well-preserved traditional mountain villages and vernacular architecture.

What to See #

• Piornedo (pallozas): Traditional stone-and-thatch dwellings and an ethnographic museum preserving local highland architecture and livestock-keeping practices, located in the village of Piornedo on the Galician side of the range.
• Highland pastures and forests: Rugged ridgelines, beech and oak woodlands and high pastures that form the core zones used for transhumant grazing and hill walking across the massif.