La Ruta de la Lana means the Wool Route and is based broadly on drove roads (cañadas) followed by drovers and their often-huge flocks, travelling to milder climates nearer the coasts for winter and to higher mountain pasture in summer. These routes, dating back to before the Middle Ages, were also used by sheep-shearers and wool merchants, and to take livestock to markets. Burgos itself was the capital of the wool trade in the 16th and 17th centuries and the routes from the SE, especially from La Mancha, were well used. This route was undoubtedly well-used by pilgrims to Santiago and there is documentation of a pilgrimage to Santiago made in 1624 by Francisco Patiño, his wife and cousin, from Monteagudo de las Salinas, a village some 45 kilometres before Cuenca.