CUALEDRO

Cualedro unfolds at the foot of the Serra do Larouco, one of the main natural monuments of the region. Larouco was, in ancient times, an indigenous god, as demonstrated by several dedications engraved on Roman altars. The parishes of A Xironda and San Millao border Portugal, specifically with the parish of Vilar de Perdizes, in the municipality of Montalegre, which gives them a privileged historical status based on intense personal and commercial relationships. In this video we approach to visit three places of interest within said town hall.

A Cidá da Saceda is located on a rocky hill at 798 m. high, in the middle of a wide Portuguese-Galician plain located between the prominent and cold Serra do Larouco (1,398 m) and the warm depression of the Támega River (385 m). This fortified town was built just over 3.5 km northwest of A Cidá de San Millao, one of the most monumental and surprising forts in the entire Monterrei region. The fort or Cidá da Saceda is located in a position that allows it to control and visually dominate the resources of the area: water, farmland, natural transit routes, mining resources such as tin, etc., all of them elements important during the Iron Age (800 BC - Year 0). This fortified high-altitude village was occupied between the s. VI a. C and I d. C. and was excavated during the 1980s. Since 2011 it has been declared an Asset of Cultural Interest.The Serra do Larouco (1,538 meters above sea level) is, without a doubt, the most unique natural monument in the municipality of Cualedro. Natural dividing line between the regions of Monterrei and A Limia, O Larouco is a mountain range common to Galicia and Portugal that holds exceptional landscape, natural and cultural values.We begin the ascent from the village of Lucenza, one of its natural accesses, we will find the “da Casa da Neve” curtain. The “casas da neve” or refrigerators are constructions for obtaining ice through the snow collected during the winter. to be consumed during the summer. The “casa da neve” that concerns us here is an oval well three meters deep that was excavated in the rock from which a channel about 10 meters long emerges to evacuate the melted ice. The “neveira”, which had a cover that has now disappeared, belonged to the House of Monterrei during the 16th and 17th centuries, as proven by a noble shield found inside.Shortly after, a series of monumental granite outcrops that were shaped by time. Wind, sun, snow and rain managed to outline on the horizon a series of natural batholiths with whimsical shapes, some of them with a figurative appearance: a dromedary, a rooster, a dog and some even say a wolf.But among all of them, one stands out, the one known as Pena Muller, a natural granite outcrop of notable height whose profile recalls the silhouette of a lady – somewhat abstract in reality – that was sculpted by the contingent chisel of time.In the 1980s, the Festa do Larouco was held at the foot of Pena Muller, promoted by a group of enthusiasts from both sides of the “raia”. Always starting with the dawn of the bagpipes, the events included a symbolic offering to the god Larouco, in the words of Rodríguez Colmenero, “preferential recipient of the religious faith and worship of the locals in dates prior to the arrival of Christianity.”