Rionansa

The church bell in Puentenansa strikes eleven, yet the loudest sound is still the river rolling over slate beds three streets below. At 180 metres above sea level that water has already fallen 900 m from the Picos de Europa, and the rush carries the chill of the cordillera even in July. Stand on the medieval bridge and you can watch trout hold position in the current—no feeding, just resting—while a farmer on the far bank coaxes two Jerseys across the lane. Nothing in Rionansa happens faster than the Nansa itself.

This is not a single village but a scatter of hamlets strung along 20 km of narrowing valley. The municipality stretches from the potato plots of Rozadío to the beech woods above Riosaco, yet barely 1,100 people call it home. Stone houses with wooden balconies are still occupied by the families who rebuilt them after the Civil War; barn doors stand open to reveal tractors bought on credit and haylofts stacked for winter. The place works for a living, which is why you will smell diesel as often as gorse.

Walking with the altitude, not against it

Most visitors arrive on the CA-181 from Cabezón de la Sal, a road that twists so tightly the local bus occasionally has to reverse to make the hairpins. Once the valley bottoms out at Puentenansa, the tarmac levels and the true scale becomes clear: hay meadows climb both flanks in terraces so steep you wonder how the cows keep their footing. Public footpaths exist, but they are unsigned affairs that start between gateposts marked “Propiedad Privada – Se ruega cerrar”. Farmers will wave you through if you greet them first; fail to do so and you may meet a dog that has never needed a leash.

A useful rule of thumb is to treat the valley as three shallow bands. The river track (flat, stony, 40 minutes return) lets you stretch your legs without leaving the 200 m contour. Mid-slope lanes—gravel, graded for tractors—circle between hamlets at 350 m and give views north towards the Bay of Biscay on clear days. Above 600 m the surface turns to grass and the only company is red deer and the occasional forester with a chainsaw. In spring these upper paths are loud with blackcaps; in November they are impassable unless you enjoy knee-deep bracken soaked in mountain rain.

What stone and slate can teach you

The Iglesia de San Martín in Puentenansa is the obvious landmark, yet its lessons are modest. Rebuilt in 1893 after a flood, the nave is wide enough for 120 parishioners and no more; the tower houses a single bell cast in 1924 that still rings the Angelus at 20:00. Step inside and the air smells of candle wax and damp stone—this is a building that breathes with the valley, not against it. Notice how the slate floor slopes gently east; when the Nansa bursts its banks the water drains straight out through the doorway, a trick learned the hard way.

Drive three minutes up the side road to Celucos and the houses grow older, their shields carved with wheatsheaves and wolves’ heads. One mansion has a 1638 datestone but satellite TV sprouting from the eaves; next door, collapse came suddenly and the roof timbers now grow moss. The contrast is deliberate, not picturesque. Cantabrian inheritance law divides property among siblings, so restoration waits until cousins agree on a price. Some will, some won’t, and the valley wears the result openly.

Weather that writes the timetable

At barely 25 km from the Atlantic, Rionansa catches weather systems head-on. Expect 1,400 mm of rain a year—double Manchester’s figure—delivered in short, theatrical bursts rather than steady drizzle. July and August offer the driest windows, yet even then an easterly flow can drag low cloud over the 1,500 m crest and drop the temperature 10 °C by teatime. The upside is humidity that keeps meadows green until October and lets orchids flourish in roadside ditches. Come in May and the valley smells of wild garlic; come in February and you may find the CA-181 closed above Riosaco by snow that melted at sea level the same afternoon.

Winter access is the dirty secret the brochures skip. The regional government grits as far as Puentenansa, but the side road to Rozadío is untreated. A week of frost turns the final kilometre into a toboggan run; locals chain up, visitors abandon hire cars in passing places and walk. If you plan a Christmas market hop, book a room in the valley rather than on the coast—night-time temperatures of –5 °C are common and the road can stay white until 11:00.

Eating what the slope provides

There is no restaurant strip, merely three bars that open when the owner is awake. The largest, attached to the petrol station in Puentenansa, serves a three-course menú del día for €12 that begins with fabada and ends with rice pudding heavy with cinnamon. Meat comes from valley veal that never saw a feedlot; the potatoes arrive still holding the morning soil. Vegetarians can request alubias blancas with spinach, but expect a pause while the cook checks whether that counts as food. Closing day is Tuesday, and if six customers fail to appear by 14:00 the lights go off regardless.

Buying supplies requires timing. The mobile fish van reaches the square at 09:30 on Thursday; bread arrives in a white van at 10:00 and sells out by 10:45. Cheese—quesada and a soft tetilla—can be begged from the dairy at Riosaco, but take your own container and expect to wait while the farmer finishes milking. The nearest supermarket is 18 km back in Cabezón, so build a picnic before you leave the coast.

Staying, or just passing through

Accommodation totals eight houses signed up to the regional rural scheme. Expect stone walls 80 cm thick, wood-burning stoves and Wi-Fi that falters whenever the river rises. Two properties sleep six and charge around €90 a night in shoulder season; the rest are two-person conversions at €65. Breakfast is not provided—drive to the bar or boil your own eggs. Electricity comes via overhead cables that still tangle with chestnut branches; storms in March 2022 left Rozadío dark for 36 hours, so pack a torch even in midsummer.

Day-trippers from Santander can cover the 65 km in 70 minutes, but that defeats the point. Stay at least one night and you will hear the Nansa shift gear after dusk, a low growl that works its way into dreams. Leave before 08:00 and the valley is yours: mist lifts off the water, a heron moves upstream, and the only footprints on the dew are yours and the milkman’s.

The part nobody photographs

Rionansa will not dazzle; it offers something narrower and more honest. The villages are tidy but not manicured, the walks rewarding yet never spectacular, the food hearty rather than refined. What you remember later is the soundscape—river, cowbells, a chainsaw thinning larch on the far slope—and the realisation that rural Spain still functions when no one is watching. Come for that, not for a checklist, and the valley will still be working when you return.