Castilla Leon Fisico

Castile and León is one of the 17 autonomous communities of Spain. Most of the terrain of Castile and León consists of a large portion of Spain's Meseta Central, surrounded by mountainous regions. The Meseta is a dry, arid high plain, with an average altitude of about 800 metres, covered by deposits of clay soil. In the north are the mountains of the provinces of Palencia and León, with high, spindly peaks and the mountains of the province of Burgos, divided in two by the Pancorbo Pass, leading from Castile to the Basque Country. Of those two parts, the more northerly belongs to the Cantabrian Mountains and continues to the city of Burgos; the mountains of the east and southeast are part of the Sistema Ibérico. In the northeast are the mountains of Zamora, whose peaks have been eroded into mesas. In the east, the mountains of Soria are also part of the Sistema Ibérico, including its highest peak, El Moncayo. Separating the northern Meseta from the southern and from Castile-La Mancha and Madrid, the Sistema Central includes the Sierra de Gata and the Sierra de Gredos in the western half and the Sierra de Guadarrama and Sierra de Ayllón in the eastern half.