Alcantud

The church bell strikes noon, yet only swifts respond. Forty-eight residents, give or take, live scattered through Alcantud’s stone warrens, and on a weekday in May you might meet none of them. The village sits 850 m above sea level on a knife-edge ridge; look south and the land drops into dry Alcarria plateaux, look north and the limestone walls of the Serranía de Cuenca rise like broken battlements. There is no gentle approach: Cuenca city lies 60 km away, the CM-2105 wriggles through cereal steppe, then corkscrews into the sickle-shaped gorge of the Guadazaón. By the time the road spits you out on Alcantud’s only paved street, mobile signal has surrendered and the engine temperature gauge hovers nervously.

Stone, Silence and Circumstance

Houses here were built for winter wolves and summer drought. Granite footings, timber beams rounded by centuries, roof tiles the colour of burnt toast. Many stand empty; their keyholes stuffed with rag to keep the draught from slamming shutters. The inhabited ones give themselves away by a tended geranium or a thread of wood-smoke at dawn. There is no shop, no bar, no ATM, no petrol pump. The last grocery closed when the proprietor died in 2017; locals now drive 26 km to Tragacete for bread and gossip. Visitors who arrive expecting a plaza lined with cafés discover instead a stone bench, a drinking fountain dated 1923, and a view straight down a ravine where griffon vultures turn lazy circles.

The parish church keeps its own counsel. Dedicated to St Peter, it was patched up after the 1917 earthquake but never enlarged; inside, a single nave, a Christ in boxwood whose feet have been worn smooth by weather rather than touch, and a ledger recording baptisms back to 1742. The door is normally locked; ask at the third house on the left (green door, barking terrier) and someone will fish out a key the size of a trowel. Donations go toward a new roof; the jar contains more peseta coins than euros.

Walking Without Waymarks

Official hiking routes stop at the municipal boundary. That suits the kind of walker who carries map, compass and a willingness to backtrack when the sheep path vaners into brambles. East of the village a farm track descends 300 m to the river Guadazaón, where emerald pools are deep enough for a bracing plunge even when the plateau above shimmers at 35 °C. Upstream, a medieval pack-bridge, single arch, no parapet, still carries the odd goat herd. Westward, the path to Fuertescusa skirts three abandoned hamlets: roofless walls, threshing circles colonised by lavender, and the smell of wild thyme crushed underfoot. Allow five hours for the 14 km circuit; carry at least two litres of water—streams run dry from June to October.

Spring brings the sound of bees and the smell of resin; the first weekend of May sees the brief blossoming of the pink snapdragon endemic to these cliffs. Autumn is mushroom territory: Boletus edulis for those who recognise them, and a free permit (obtainable online from the Junta de Comunidades) allowing two kilos per person per day. Winter arrives overnight, usually between 15 October and 15 November. Snow can block the access road for two days; villagers keep freezers stocked and four-wheel-drive cars chained. Photographers prize these mornings—hoar frost on stone, smoke hanging in the valley like gunpowder—but the practical traveller should check the DGT traffic app before setting out.

Where to Sleep and How Not to Starve

Accommodation is limited to two rural houses and a clutch of apartments five kilometres down the hill in Baños de Alcantud, a thermal hamlet that never quite became a spa town. Casa Rural de Yeri (three doubles, €85 per night mid-season) occupies a former priest’s house; thick walls mean Wi-Fi reaches the landing but not the bedrooms. Heating is by pellet stove—host Jesús delivers a sack on arrival and expects you to manage the thermostat like a responsible adult. The apartments at Baños are newer, swimming-pool modern, but you trade altitude for convenience: mid-summer nights stay ten degrees warmer than the village proper.

Food requires planning. The nearest restaurant is in Vega del Codorno, 19 km by corkscrew road, open weekends only. It serves solid Castilian fare—roast lamb shoulder for two at €28, house wine from a plastic jug—then closes abruptly if trade is slow. Bring supplies: Cuenca’s Mercadona (open till 9:30 pm) is the last reliable supermarket. In Alcantud itself, knock on Concha’s door opposite the church on Saturday morning; she sells free-range eggs and seasonal honey, prices scrawled on the lid of a biscuit tin. If she offers you a glass of anisado, accept; refusal counts as poor etiquette.

Fiestas That Swell the Streets

On the second weekend of August the population quadruples. Returned emigrants from Madrid and Valencia park hatchbacks along the single street and string fairy lights between balconies. The fiesta programme fits on one sheet: Saturday evening mass followed by a procession in which the statue of the Virgin is carried exactly 200 m to a temporary altar of pine branches; midnight fireworks launched from a tractor trailer; Sunday lunchtime paella for 200 cooked outdoors in a pan the size of a satellite dish. Visitors are welcome to queue, but bring your own plate and spoon—cutlery runs out fast. By Monday lunchtime the exodus begins; by Wednesday the village is once again left to the vultures and the echo of departing cars.

The Price of Quiet

There is no entrance fee, no interpretation centre, no gift shop. What Alcantud demands is self-sufficiency: fuel tank at least half full, phone charged, bonnet checked. The reward is a landscape that has not changed its rhythm since the 1950s—grain threshed in July, pigs slaughtered in December, the church bell still marking the hours that smartphones have forgotten. Come if you are content with your own company, if you measure a successful day by the number of kilometres walked without meeting another soul, if you can accept that the most exciting event might be a lammergeier gliding overhead. Otherwise, stay on the motorway and leave the silence to those who have chosen to guard it.