Las Minas del Riotinto: A Red River??
Trip Start
May 15, 2008
1
2
60
Trip End
Jul 24, 2008
Riotinto,
Spain and Canary Islands
Sunday, May 18, 2008
Our first stop was Riotinto, which literally translates to Tinted (Red) River (Río Tinto). It gets its name from the naturally red lake and river that runs through it. The river is red because of the mixture of natural mineral deposits in the area. It is such a unique river, the only in the world, that NASA has done research there comparing the 2.5pH water with over 300 types of organisms living in it to the bodies of water that covered Mars millions of years ago.
Because of all of these mineral deposits, this is the richest mining region in Spain, with the riches copper deposits on Earth and silver, gold, and sulfur deposits as well. The area has been mined in open pits for the past 5,000 years, long before the Romans arrived in the region. It was known in Biblical times for its mining richness. Much later, in the late 1800s, the British took the mines over, and were only replaced by American companies in the 1950s. Because of pretty much continual mining for so long, Riotinto's landscape is devastated, yet somehow beautiful. It looks more like a desert or a setting from Star Wars than like the surrounding farmland and mountains.
