Roman roads, granite ridges and glacial lagoons — a national park one train from Sol
The Sierra de Guadarrama runs a 2,400-metre granite wall across the region's northwest, close enough that its snow is visible from Gran Vía rooftops half the year. Within it: a national park, a genuine Roman road, glacial cirques, and the walking culture that invented Spanish mountaineering — much of it reachable by commuter rail, which is a sentence few capitals can write.
Routes below run easiest to hardest. Every one names its base town — sleep there the night before and you're on the trail while the Madrid day-trippers are still queueing for the 8:30 train.
Oak meadows below the monastery to the king's granite viewing seat — the gentlest classic, gorgeous in autumn.
Legion-laid paving up a pine valley to the 1,796 m pass, back by the painters' forest track — the sierra's best introduction.
Riverside forest from El Paular monastery to a double waterfall — the Lozoya valley at its greenest.
The century-old yellow-dot traverse through the pines — ride the C-9 rail up, walk down to the trains home.
Europe's largest granite batholith — domes, needles, griffon vultures and the helmet-shaped Yelmo above the castle town.
The seven-summited ridge that is the range's signature skyline — non-technical but honest mountain walking.
The roof of the Guadarrama at 2,428 m, with glacial lagoons on the descent — start from the Puerto de Cotos, reachable by the C-9 mountain rail.
The slate-country viewpoint loop above Patones de Arriba, the Atazar reservoir spread below — the dry, cistus-scented other face of the sierra.