Los Alcornocales natural park - Cadiz - Costa de la Luz

Naturpark de Alc...

Alcornocales, Pi...

The natural park of los Alcornocales is the world’s largest cork oak forest, covering an area of 170,025 hectares, between the province of Cadiz and the province of Malaga in Spain's southern region of Andalusia.
The park is made up of a series of low mountainranges containing more sandstone than limestone, unlike the neighbouring natural park of Sierra de Grazalema, where the reverse is true, and, as the third largest park in Andalusia, is one of the region’s most important protected areas, stretching as far as the Straits of Gibraltar. Its interior houses Cortes de la Frontera National Game Reserve. Rhododendrons, ferns and laurels grow in the shade. In the south are the canutos, river valleys in which species of vegetation from the tertiary period still survive.

The park is an important centre for ecological, rural and educational tourism due to its immense archaeological, cultural, historical and monumental value. It successfully combines compact patches of protected cork and gall oaks with cork extraction, big game and cattle farming.

Towns of los Alcornocales nature park

In the province of Cadiz: Alcalá de los Gazules, Algeciras, Castellar de la Frontera, Los Barrios, Medina Sidonia, Tarifa y Jimena de la Frontera.
In the province of Málaga: Cortes de la Frontera.