Between the Cerro de los Ángeles, the Manzanares River, the Southeast Regional Park, and the city of Getafe (the locality that was annexed as a neighborhood in 1850, ceasing to be a municipality) lies Perales del Río. In 1977, an old gypsum quarry on its outskirts was abandoned, becoming an illegal dump for years. From the 1990s onward, the area was restored on several occasions with cleanup work, removal of the debris from old buildings, and various plantings. Thus the Horna Lagoons were born, a wetland with four water surfaces (two of them temporary) surrounded by wooded areas (primarily pines, but also almond trees, tamarisks and ashes) and inhabited by various amphibians (such as the common spotted newt) and aquatic birds (also serving as a refuge for birds of prey that feed on the abundant rabbits).
Two years ago, Cristian García (a Getafe resident and Biology student at the Complutense University of Madrid) discovered the place: “The Cerro de los Ángeles seemed small to me, and I recalled some anecdotes told within my maternal family about lagoons behind the hill, “the gypsum lagoons.” A search on Google Maps was all it took to expand my “playground,” he recalls, also noting that at that moment the place clearly had lived “better days.” A site that, apparently, almost no one knew about, despite the multiple things within the surroundings indicating otherwise. A site frequented by poachers, people who release their dog and neglect it for long minutes, ATVs and enduro motorcycles, drunken parties, casual sexual encounters, illegal fishing and, of course, a hotspot for illegal dumps.
