Val D'Aran

The Val d'Aran (Catalan: Vall d'Aran ; Spanish: Valle de Arán ), sometimes referred to as the Aran Valley in English, is a valley (620.47 km²) in the Pyrenees mountains and a comarca (county) in the northwestern part of the province of Lleida, in Catalonia, northern Spain. Most of the valley constitutes the only part of Spain, and of Catalonia, on the north face of the Pyrenees, hence the only part of Catalonia whose waters drain into the Atlantic Ocean. The region is characterized by an Atlantic climate, due to its peculiar orientation, which is different from other valleys in Catalonia. As of 2001, most people in the Val d'Aran spoke Spanish (38.78%) as their native language, followed by Aranese (34.19%), then Catalan (19.45%) with 7.56% having a different native language. Speakers of languages other than the local Aranese are typically people born outside the valley, or their children.

The Val d'Aran borders France on the north, the Spanish Autonomous Community of Aragon to the west and the Catalan comarques of Alta Ribagorça to the south and Pallars Sobirà to the east. The capital of the comarca is Vielha, with 3,692 inhabitants (1996). The entire population of the valley is about 7,130 (1996). The Garonne river passes through the Val d'Aran after rising on the Saburedo Cirque and receiving the water of the Joèu river (from the slopes of nearby Pic Aneto and passing underground at the Forau de Aigualluts). It then reappears in the Val dera Artiga as a resurgence and flows into the Val d'Aran which is one of the highest valleys of the Pyrenees. The Noguera Pallaresa, with its head only a hundred meters from that of the Garona, flows the other way, toward the Mediterranean.

The Val d'Aran used to be without direct communication with the south side of the mountains during winter, until the construction of the Vielha tunnel, opened in 1948. On October 3, 1949, Spanish Communist Party guerrillas tried to force the fall of Spanish government bursting into the valley and controlling some villages until October 27, 1949.