Climbing La Maliciosa from La Baranca Sierra de Guadarrama In and around the mountains of Madrid Sierra de Guadarrama © Copyright “name”, 2010. All Rights Reserved Created by Stephen Fernandez Osmunda Consulting    Made with Xara Web Designer La Baranca to the top of La Maliciosa La Baranca to La Maliciosa Time 5 – 6 hours  Difficulty Medium/Hard  Yellow and White Markers.  This, in one of the most attractive mountains in La Sierra. Unfortunately it does look over Bola del Mundo a mountain totally spoilt by the building of what looks like Spain’s imitation of NASA on top. However, if you look in any other direction it is spectacular. There are several routes to the top, this particular one is a fairly hard slog but worth it as you feel that you have achieved something. Total time to the top is about 2:30 – 3 hours, if you are returning by the same route you need to allow almost as long for the return as it is a Knee cruncher (Trecking Poles recommended) Park at the Hotel La Baranca and proceed up the forestry road. (Note: on a nice weekend this is a very popular spot for picnicking families, so parking can get a bit full, but don’t worry you will soon leave the hoards behind) Go up the road passed the gate and 2 small reservoirs on the right. After about 15 or so minutes you come to a very sharp bend in the road to the left. At the bend another path goes off to right down to the stream, take this path. This path takes a more direct route up through the trees, you will cross the original forestry road twice until you come to the Fuente de la Campaña. When you reach the Fuente (and don’t forget to ring the bell) carry on directly behind the spring still following the white and yellow markers. After a while the fun starts as the path begins to get quite hard, sometimes disintegrating to a scree slope. It can be a bit tricky to keep to the actual path here as it is a bit confusing, that said the path may be tricky but the route and direction are clear, straight up to the saddle so even if you stray of the actual path a bit you won’t go wrong. You should reach the Col in about 2 hours. Off to the left is a very clear track to Bola del Mundo but it is the slightly less clear track to the right we want. Follow this up basically until you can go no further and the turn left and follow the path (much easier now) to the top of La Maliciosa. When you get there sit back eat your sandwiches and enjoy the view. The return is just a case of retracing your steps, but be careful of your knees.