This exciting mountain biking tour offers the best of two worlds - a core of several days of some of the best of mountain biking in Spain, sandwiched around some of the country's best historical sightseeing. The itinerary starts and ends with an afternoon and night in two of Iberia's most spectacular historic cities, both designated as World Heritage Sites by UNESCO - Avila, famed for its perfectly preserved medieval walls, and Toledo, with its rich and complex history as the nation's former capital where Jews, Christians and Moors lived in harmony for generations. The rest of the tour will be spent following our classic inn-to-inn mountain biking itinerary - designed so that you bike from one night's accommodation to the next - in the beautiful Sierra de Gredos. The Sierra de Gredos mountains contain central Spain's highest peaks and over 50% of the peninsula's species of fauna and flora. The region is a true paradise for mountain bikers, hikers, walkers, rock climbers, bird watchers and nature lovers - yet hardly discovered by non-Spaniards. It offers hundreds of kilometres of superb terrain for mountain biking of all levels. This is a special place in Spain that few visitors ever have the privilege of knowing - with a magnificent natural environment, and where the everyday sights of goatherds and their flocks wandering the mountainsides, farmers harvesting by hand and carrying their produce in panniers on donkeys' backs all point to a culture still rooted in an age long past. Our carefully crafted itinerary begins in Spain's highest provincial capital - Avila, then shifts to the lovely sub-alpine Tormes Valley (1,500m / 4,920 ft). From here, you ride for the next 5 days on broad royal livestock drovers' trails, narrow shepherds' paths, a Roman road, logging roads, mountain trails, forest single-tracks and quiet paved back roads. Flower-filled meadows, awesome mountain views or shady forest groves around every curve. Our final biking destination is Arenas de San Pedro (450 m/ 1,475 ft), capital of the Tiétar Valley, where you spend your second-to-last night before transferring to spend your last day and night sightseeing in historic Toledo to complete the tour. This tour is designed for recreational mountain bikers of intermediate ability and fitness - with more technical or longer route options for those of a more hard-core nature, as well as easier options for those who want to just take it easy.