Pyrenees Trip June 2024 - Part 10 Estany de Sant Maurici, Spain

Hope everyone had a great Christmas! Ours was enjoyable, just my brother here with us as usual. Lots of food and watching cheesy things on the TV! 😀

I made a mistake in my last post saying we were heading for Andorra. Well, we were, but not before we had this great day out in the Aigüestortes i Estany de Sant Maurici National Park in Spain, at the lake of Sant Maurici. Estany is the Catalan word for lake.

We spent the night in the village of Espot, from where there is a small road leading up to the parking for the lake, which is a good 3.5kms from the lake itself. However, no motorhomes are allowed to park there! The only other way to get to the lake is to pay for a 4wd taxi, which operate from the tourist office. We had no choice but to opt for this, though really I was very pleased that we didn't have to walk 7km just to get to the lake and back from the car park! We weren't the only people taking the taxis as they were quite busy. In no time we arrived at the lake and it was fabulous. We were blessed this day with blue sky and sunshine and warmth, despite the altitude of 1,912m.

At last there were wildflowers and butterflies!

In the collage below are:
Top: Deptford Pink (Dianthus armeria)
Bottom left: Veronica orsiniana I can't find an English name for this plant.
Bottom right: Cypress Spurge (Euphorbia cyparissias)

Before showing the butterflies that I did manage to capture I have to mention the one that got away - well it never stopped flying so there wasn't a chance. But I knew what it was immediately. It was a large butterfly and one of my most want to see ones - a Camberwell Beauty (Nymphalis antiopa)! Also known as the Mourning Cloak in N. America. That absolutely made my day!

Left: Pearl Bordered Fritillary (Boloria euphrosyne) I think!
Top right: Common Heath Moth (Ematurga atomaria)
Bottom right: Small Blue (Cupido minimus)

We decided to walk to the waterfall at the other end of the lake and first walked along beside the lake, which had amazingly clear water, then it was uphill after that.

Wild Columbines (Aquilegia vulgaris) - I'm so used to this as a garden plant!

A trio of Skippers. ID is very hard! On the left is a Skipper of the Pyrgus genus, which are mostly various Grizzled Skippers, but I can't ID it. On the top right is, I think, a Dingy Skipper (Erynnis tages), going by the underwing markings mostly. Bottom right is another Pyrgus, possibly the Large Grizzled Skipper (Pyrgus alveus) which would be a lifer, along with the Camberwell Beauty.

It wasn't all nice boardwalk like this. Mostly it involved scrambling up a rocky path with as usual, K hauling me up the steep bits. 😁

Large Flowered Butterwort (Pinguicula grandiflora), an insectivorous plant, which I adore. It’s so pretty especially with the bright green leaves.

This is where the Butterworts were growing, in amongst water trickling from higher up the mountain.

An Old World Swallowtail (Papilio machaon).

Asp Viper (Vipera aspis). This was exciting as we so rarely see snakes, and I've never seen a viper before. It was a small snake and wouldn't stop moving, but we got some good views of it. It's more venomous than the European adder!

Finally we got to the waterfall, which was worth the climb to see it.

After the waterfall we had our picnic by the shores of the lake and had a general wander around after that before taking a taxi back again, which felt so luxurious!

A collage of blue butterflies. Now my two insect ID apps told me the bottom two images were Adonis Blue but I'm not sure about that. It's possible both butterflies (top one and bottom one) are Common Blues (Polyommatus icarus) but I'll just leave it as that unless anyone out there can help. 😀

It was really a fabulous day out and I'm so pleased that finally we started to see what I had been hoping to see all holiday - wildflowers, butterflies and sunshine! Next up really is Andorra though.

Below is a map of our journey from Aran Park to Lake Sant Maurici.

I will end by wishing you all a Happy and Healthy New Year 2025 and I hope all your dreams come true!