Spain or Portugal Waterfalls?

Question

I'm travelling to Portugal and Spain and really want to swim in a waterfall but I'm not sure where one is. If there are any reasonably close to Lisbon, or Seville or Granada or Barcelona that would be great. But if you know of any waterfalls in either country please let me know.

Thanks a bunch!

Answer 1

I don't know about Portugal, but in southern Spain you are not likely to find any worthwhile waterfalls...

Grazalema is a nice hilly/woody area, and it has the greatest percentage of rain in all of southern Spain (it has a micro-climate), however it has no waterfalls to speak of. (Sue made a slight error, it is not between Seville and Granada but in the province of Cádiz close to Ronda (Málaga)

You could find some small waterfalls in Jaen in Cazorla National Park. However, due to the drought of these last years they have dwindled to almost non-existant.

There is a waterfall in Seville...Las Cascadas del Huesna (37°59′32″N, 5°39′46″O)  two kms. downriver from San Nicolás del Puerto, (province of Seville), but I don't know how large it would be now, again because of the lack of rain.

There are in total about 50 waterfalls (cascadas) declared as such in Spain, most of them are in the northern part of the country... Cantabria, Burgos, Huesca (alto Aragón near the Pyrenees),  Albacete, Cuenca and two near Madrid.

I have found one reference to a waterfall in Portugal:

CAÑÓN DE FAFIÄO. RÍO TOCO. (Sierra de Gerés. Portugal)

Answer 2

The rivers in all three of those places are pretty flat.  Granada is a bit of an exception, there could be something nearby, outside of town, that would have a waterfall, it's in the Sierra Nevada, after all.  But the water there would be about 35º F.  A bit too chilly for swimming.  

If you are interested in something a bit out of the way, there's probably something in Grazalema Park, between Sevilla and Granada.

I know of a beautiful waterfall in Cuenca province, but that's nowhere near where you are talking about.

And there's a very pretty one in Ronda, near the town of Grazalema, on the edge of the park, which I believe you can stand under, but I don´t know about a pool there, or any place to swim.

Here's a couple of photos.

http://flickr.com/photos/susan_payer/120...  

There´s a hiking trail that takes you down there, from where I was standing.

Another view...the waterfall is in the top, center:

http://flickr.com/photos/susan_payer/120...

Another shot of the gorge.

http://flickr.com/photos/susan_payer/120...

Ronda is a beautiful town, set, as you can probably tell, upon a huge, steep cliff sided mountain, which was terrific for protection in case of seige...tons of wars along the border for hundreds of years.  VERY interesting village!