A vane It is an object that is installed on top of a construction so that, when the wind, may spin and indicate your address. It is common for the weather vane to be shaped like an animal, such as a rooster or a horse, although it can also be an arrow or anything else.
The vanes, therefore, are devices that present a pointer to reveal the address of the wind. This marker is usually linked to a cross that shows the cardinal points. Thanks to its mechanism, the different pieces of the weather vane rotate when receiving the action of the wind, showing its direction.
In order for them to fulfill their function, the vanes must be installed as high as possible. In this way, trees and buildings are prevented from altering the actual direction of the wind. That is why the weather vanes usually appear on the roofs of the houses or on the terraces of the buildings.
Although the origin of the weather vane is not exactly known, it is known that this instrument has been among human creations for more than two millennia; A clear example is found in the Agora Roman temple of Athens, built between 19 and 11 BC. C., where a rooster-shaped weathervane was placed.
By extension to this meaning, the term weather vane is also used to name a subject who usually changing your thinking, behavior, or attitude frequently. As can be seen, this meaning works by analogy to the constant movement of a weather vane, which changes its position before any wind.
Suppose a politician showed up, in 1998, as a candidate for president of the Liberal Party. Four years later, the same leader is running as a candidate for the Conservative Party. In 2006, the same politician announces his incorporation to the Progressive Democratic Party. For all these changes in less than a decade, many analysts rate the man in question as vane.
In Spain we find the Veleta Peak, the fourth highest in the country and the second of its Mountain range, only surpassed by Teide, in Tenerife, Mulhacén, in Sierra Nevada, and Aneto, in the Pyrenees. The Pico del Veleta rises to 3395.68 meters above sea level and is located in Granada, one of the most important Andalusian provinces at an international level, in part because it was the birthplace of one of the most significant poets in history. , Federico García Lorca, as well as the land in which they took his life in such a tragic and unfair way.
Despite what it may seem, the name of this peak does not refer to the instrument mentioned above to calculate the direction of the wind, but comes from the Arabic term balata, which can be defined as “balate, cut, cut”, and refers to the marked cuts, some with slopes of up to 500 meters, which can be seen on three of their faces. Also, it is important to understand that this word is masculine, unlike the previous one (the Vane).
Among the most interesting features of the Peak from the Veleta we found an area of permafrost with fossil ice that seems to come from 13,000 years ago, when the last ice age occurred. It is worth mentioning that permafrost areas are permanently frozen, although not always with ice or snow.
El Pico del Veleta is an ideal place for lovers of piste, extreme and cross-country skiing, hiking, climbing and mountaineering, thanks to having the highest slopes in the entire mountain range of Sierra Nevada, some areas of snow and other rock. In addition, every year a marathon is practiced at the beginning of August that ends in the port of the Veleta.
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