Alagon

The aqueduct east of Alagón isn’t Roman. Locals call it El Caracol, the snail, because the brickwork spirals like a shell, and it was built in 1930 to carry irrigation water, not legions. That detail sets the tone for the place: practical, slightly eccentric, and happy to let visitors make assumptions. Drive the A-68 service road, pull over beside the crash barrier, and you can photograph the curve without leaving the car—handy if the wind is whipping across the river flats and the thermometer reads 6 °C, which it often does between December and February.

Alagón sits only 235 m above sea level, low enough for the Ebro to spread into lazy meanders and for morning mist to hang longer than on the surrounding plateau. The village is 25 km south-west of Zaragoza, close enough that commuters keep house prices sensible, far enough that tour buses never bother. Ryanair’s early-morning flight from Stansted lands at Zaragoza-Delicias at 11:40 local time; a pre-booked taxi can have you in Alagón before the Spanish lunch hour starts, though you’ll pay €35–40 for the privilege. The alternative is the Alsa coach that leaves the same station at 13:30 and 19:00 on weekdays, costs €2.50, and takes 35 minutes—perfectly adequate unless you’re hauling a bicycle box.

River Time and Field Time

The Ebro defines the pace. In spring the water is the colour of builder’s tea, swollen by Pyrenean snowmelt, and the riverside poplars glow acid-green. By late July the level drops, sandbanks emerge, and the current slows to a polite shuffle. Either season is preferable to August, when the air stalls at 38 °C and the only shade is inside the church or the baker’s. Autumn brings storks on the overhead wires and the first proper aubergines to the weekly market; winter is sharp, bright, and usually dry, though a northerly can knife straight through the alleyways.

Walk the soto—the river woodland—on the path that starts behind the municipal pool. It is flat, muddy after rain, and loud with chiffchaffs in April. You will share it with dog-walkers and the occasional angler after carp or lucio (pike). Fishing permits are sold at the tobacconist on Calle San Roque; bring passport photocopies and cash, because cards are treated with suspicion. After two kilometres the track reaches an irrigation lock built in 1952; turn back there unless you fancy a ten-kilometre loop through artichoke fields that smell faintly salty when the soil dries.

Brick, Timber and a Bell that Rings Twice on Sundays

The centre is a grid of low houses the colour of digestive biscuits, their balconies painted the green you see on late-Franco police stations. At the middle stands the parish church of the Natividad, begun in the 16th century, patched after every war since. The tower is mudéjar—brickwork in honey-coloured diamonds—and you can climb it on Friday evenings if the sacristan is in the mood (tip €2). The view shows you how small Alagón really is: five minutes in any direction and you are among onion warehouses or the poly tunnel sprawl that feeds Mercadona.

Opposite the church, the former convent of San Miguel is now the senior citizens’ social club. Ring the bell and someone will let you into the cloister, where the stone still smells of burnt wax from last winter’s belén nativity scene. There is no gift shop, no audio guide, just a laminated sheet in Spanish and the echo of your own footsteps. That is roughly the level of infrastructure you should expect.

Food Without the Fanfare

Alagón does not do tasting menus. What it does is a €14 menú del día at Hotel Restaurante Los Angeles on the main drag, a place that doubles as the local wedding venue and the bus drivers’ coffee stop. Expect grilled lamb cutlets, hand-cut chips, a half-bottle of Rioja and a slab of flan; ask for the lamb “bien hecho” if pink centres worry you. If you are here on the Thursday before Ash Wednesday—Jueves Lardero—the bakeries sell tortas (soft white rolls) stuffed with longaniza sausage for €1.80. The queue forms at 10 a.m.; by noon the chorizo version is gone. Vegetarians can try the artichoke hearts stewed with potatoes, but you need to ask, because menus assume meat is compulsory.

When the Village Lets its Hair Down

Fiestas begin properly on 15 August with a procession of the Virgen and end ten days later when the last firecracker has been lobbed at the policía local. Nights are loud; the bull-running is of the plastic-barricade variety, and anyone who has survived Pamplona will find it tame. Semana Santa is more atmospheric—hooded cofradías, a single drum, streets lit by candles in paper bags. If you want authenticity without the thump of reggaeton, come then, but book a room in Zaragoza: Alagón has no hotels inside the town limits, only the roadside hostal west of the junction, and it fills with truckers who start their engines at 5 a.m.

Getting it Wrong, Getting it Right

British visitors usually arrive by mistake, having typed “Alagon” (one accent, or none) into a booking site and landed on a Zaragoza city hotel 25 km away. Double-check the map pin before you pay. If you plan to rely on public transport, remember the last bus back to Zaragoza leaves at 20:00; miss it and a taxi is your only escape. Hire cars can be picked up at the airport; the Hertz desk shuts for siesta between 14:00 and 16:30, so schedule flights accordingly.

Rain is rarer than in Manchester, but when it comes the streets flood because the Ebro’s irrigation ditches overflow. Waterproof shoes are more use than a brolly, which the wind will invert. In July the mosquitos from the river soto are vicious; pack repellent or regret it at 3 a.m. when the church bell marks the quarter hour.

Worth the Detour?

Alagón will never compete with the Pyrenean stone villages that fill Instagram feeds. It is flat, occasionally scruffy, and determinedly workaday. That is also why it is interesting: a place where agriculture still dictates the clock, where the bar owner remembers your order the second morning, and where the loudest sound at night is the grain dryer humming across the railway line. Treat it as a side dish to Zaragoza—drive over for lunch, walk the river, climb the tower—and you will leave with the satisfaction of having seen Aragón without the filter.