Pico del Veleta

Granada

The pavement stops about ten metres below the summit, which makes this the highest paved road in Europe. Past Hoya de la Mora, above the ski station, it is closed to general traffic, and a bicycle is one of the few things still allowed up. The height is published three ways, 3,394, 3,396 or 3,398 metres, third highest on the Iberian Peninsula on any of them.

The final twelve kilometres run through open, treeless terrain past the Sierra Nevada Ski Station, the highest ski resort in Spain and a former host of World Cup ski races. The Corral de la Veleta, a small glacier tucked into a north-facing hollow near the summit, was the southernmost glacier in Europe before it disappeared in 1913. Even the Vuelta a Espana stops short of the top: its Sierra Nevada stage finishes at the ski station and has never continued past Hoya de la Mora, the road above judged too extreme for a Grand Tour. The name comes from the Arabic balata, meaning cliff, and the final approach earns it, with the mountain's north face rising as a near-vertical wall for the last several kilometres of switchbacks.

From riders

What you'll see

Bare, treeless slopes climb in switchback after switchback toward Veleta's near-vertical north face, with the Sierra Nevada ski station's lift lines visible on the mountainside below.

Practical

The road closes to general traffic at a barrier above Hoya de la Mora, about two-thirds of the way up, since the Sierra Nevada National Park was created in 1999; past it, only cyclists, walkers, ski-station and park staff, and a summer microbus for hikers use the road up to Posiciones del Veleta at 3,100 metres.

Checked 13 August 2026

Part of: The highest paved roads in North AmericaSierra nevadaMountain passSki station