Puntos de Interés
Municipality
Nofuentes
In the north of the province of Burgos is the town of Nofuentes, the municipal seat of the Merindad de Cuesta-Urria. It belonged to Castilla la Vieja de Laredo and had royal jurisdiction.
One of its main characteristics is that it was one of the few localities in the area that had its own railway station. This complex served the Santander-Mediterranean Sea railway line, which operated between 1930 and 1985. The aim of this infrastructure was to link the ports of Santander and Valencia but, in the end, the line was never completed. Nevertheless, it was in operation for more than fifty years from the Cidad-Dosante station, in the north of Burgos, and Calatayud, where it connected with another line of the Ferrocarril Central de Aragón (Aragon Central Railway), which headed for Teruel and Valencia.
The town has several buildings worth mentioning. One of them is the convent of Santa María de Rivas. The complex stands majestically in the upper part of the village, from a position that allows it to dominate the lower course of the river Nela. The story goes that a woman from Villapanillo called Juana, together with two other women from the area, retired to a hermitage near Nofuentes, following the rules of the Poor Clares of Tordesillas. In 1432, Pope Eugene IV granted them a founding bull and wanted to name Juana abbess of the convent, which could be built thanks to the contributions of the Velasco and Mendoza families, as well as the bishop of Burgos.
Within the hamlet is also the parish church of San Pedro and San Pablo. It is a simple building with a single rectangular-shaped nave on whose façade there is a robust square belfry divided into three sections. The upper part houses the bells and is composed of several semicircular-arched openings whose keystone is in relief.
On 29th June, the patron saint festivities of Saint Peter and Saint Paul are celebrated, while the local festivities take place on 15th May, coinciding with Saint Isidore the Laborer.