The Camino Real de las Hoces (between Pesquera and Bárcena de Pie de Concha) is a section of the “Camino Real de Reinosa a Santander”, planned to facilitate the movement of cereals and wool from the Castilian plateau to the port of Santander.
The path is part of a more ambitious plan developed in the 18th century by the Marqués de la Ensenada, an enlightened politician serving Fernando VI, and consisted of building a network of roads and navigable canals to improve communications and facilitate the formation of a national market for agricultural products. The works were carried out between 1749 and 1753, becoming the main means of communication and trade between the Meseta and the Cantabrian Sea, until the arrival of the railway in 1866.