Centro de Visitantes Sotama, Cantabria, Spain

3EmmaDurnford 5:00 PM Jun 15, 2018

Great building but very disappointing inside
Towards the end of our stay at the excellent Hotel Del Oso in Cosgaya (see my separate review), we realised that we had not visited the Picos de Europa interpretation centre just outside of Potes and we were keen to make sure we had not missed anything in the area before we moved on. There is plenty of parking outside and the building is modern and very impressively designed. However, unfortunately the contents do not match the impressiveness of the building at all. The exhibits and photographs are faded and discoloured even through they cannot be that old. There are large areas of wasted space and the models of the birds and other wildlife are not life size (some very big, other much smaller) and they are totally out of scale with each other. The most interesting part was the geology section and explanation of the formation of the Picos de Europa - that was good. I had been hoping to be able to buy some guides to the local flora and fauna but the shop was closed and what we could see through the window was very limited. Much is also made of the viewing platform at the top of the building but in actual fact this is just a room with closed windows on one side - the view outside of the centre is just as good. So to summarise, an impressive building which is fully accessible to those with mobility issues but… so much more could be made of the inside space and the interpretive exhibits, it is a real shame.