Alien landscapes… Blood red water… mines… My Wednesday Walk Along the “Río tinto” Huelva, Spain

Hi all 😊

With this post I’m joining in at the Wednesday Walk challenge and Make me Smile challenge. That are hosted by @tattoodjay and @elizacheng every week on Wednesday.

Today I want to share with you my Walk (and partly drive) along the Río Tinto, its mines and area around it from 28 October 2021.
I stopped at a few stops driving down from the mines along the river, parked up and started walking. I show you what I saw along my walks. 😳😱

The route I drove. And along it I stopped about 5 times to walk and explore.

The locations I show you are all located in the Huelva province in Spain and it looked like I was on another planet 👽 😳 scary…. In some ways.
No filters used on my iPhone photographs.

“Rio tinto” and “Embalsa de Gossán” where the 2 locations that stood out the most to me.

More information you find Here, Here and
Here ( in Spanish)

To sum it all up, in a little description:

The Río Tinto / red river is a river in southwestern Spain, Huelva Province that rises in the Sierra Morena mountains of Andalucía. It flows south-southwest, reaching the Gulf of Cádiz at Huelva.
The Rio Tinto river has a unique red colour derived from its chemical makeup that is extremely acidic and with very high levels of iron and heavy metals.
The river maintains its colour for an approximate length of 50 kilometres. After the 50 km mark, the chemistry makeup from the water in the river slowly declines, as does the red colouring. The location where the chemistry of the river is altered is near a town called Niebla. There the Rio Tinto blends its water with other water from streams that are connected to the Atlantic ocean.

The river is around 100 km (62 miles) long and is located within the Iberian Pyrite Belt. This area has large amounts of ore and sulphide deposits.
The Rio Tinto area has been the source of 5,000 years of ore-mining, including copper, silver, gold and other minerals, extracted as far as 20 kilometres from the river shores.
As a result of the mining, the Río Tinto is very acidic and its deep reddish hue is due to iron dissolved in the water.
Acid mine drainage from the mines leads to severe environmental problems, because the acidity dissolves heavy metals into the water.
There are severe environmental concerns over the pollution in the river. 🤨 (you just have to look at it and its surrounding)
Although the river represents a harsh environment for life, some microorganisms classified as extremophiles do thrive in these conditions.
Such life forms include certain species of bacteria, algae and heterotrophs.

Let me show you my walk now:
We start at the “Embalsa de Gossán” where you can see trees covered with sulphide deposits.

It looks so Alien worldly out here… 👽

It is next to a very busy road, without footpaths. I parked a little way back. And walked carefully along the road, when a car came I stopped and went as far as possible from the road. There is a barrier. When possible I climbed over. Then walked down towards the “lake” where I took these photographs.

Me taking a photo of the ground

I didn’t stay to long as it is not healthy to be around here…
So I walked back to the car. I saw across the road on the other side another location to explore… let’s have a quick look:

The same deposits on the trees…

Ruins of a building…

More ruins here of times long forgotten…

I walked further back along this side as I thought I saw a bridge which I maybe could go under to be quicker at the car on the other side… no didn’t work out. So I crossed the road a bit further up, walked to the car and drove further to my next stop.

The “Minas de Río Tinto”, The red rivers mines

I stopped at the parking lot, I saw behind me an old digger…. Rusty machine.

Behind it this mining landscape.

At the lookout I could see the mines… there had been just a blast from dynamite 🧨 and everything was still covered in dust.

I waited a while until the dust cloud would disappear. You can see the mines more clearly now.

We drive further now and reach an parking lot next to the “Río Tinto” where you can go on a touristy train to discover the area. But due to COVID it wasn’t operational. So I explored the area by foot.
Let’s walk…

View from the parking lot across…

Building across the street.

Look what I found, some StreetArt hidden away 😎

Old machinery… the sign said this truck will be renovated for the museum. Vandals did smash it’s window though.

Walking down a little track towards where I saw the white car drive. I thought I can see the river better down there.

Yes, found the red river.

Let’s take a closer look.

Its colour is really dark red… like blood

In the back of the train station was a factory, suddenly a harsh chemical smell came from there… it was biting in my nose. So decided to return quickly to the car. And drive further.

Along the way… green trees.

Following the river down further I stop at another parking lot where you can walk along it.
I see this sign:

With actual walking trails.

I follow a path to the right and find a wide river: The Red River

It looks so surreal… sad in a way, but also beautiful at the same time.

Look at those colours

I follow the river to the right… over the rocks.

Close up of some deposits on a rock.

As I reach further I see a path back up. I follow and cross the road where I see this sign.

I walk along the road past the parking lot towards a bridge as I want to see the view from above it towards the river.

The red colour seems even darker in this stretch of the river.

I take one last photo…
With this one I want to end my #WednesdayWalk and #Makemesmile… post.

Hope you enjoyed my photos even though it showed a large amount of devastation of nature that doesn’t look like it is reversible…. But it also makes for some amazing photographs 🤩

Thank you for looking and reading😊 and if you liked my post, an upvote or re-blog is always welcome 🙏🏻
Any questions or comments, let me know. Always happy to help.

Have a great Wednesday all 😎
Grtz Jackie

Unless stated otherwise: All art and photos used in my posts are taken, created and owned by me. If you wish to use any of my photographs, please contact me first. As I have used some commercially myself.