Portalrubio de Guadamejud

The church bell tolls twice. Nothing else moves. From the stone bench outside the 17th-century Iglesia de San Pedro, the view stretches across wheat-coloured plains that ripple like a calm sea towards the Sierra de Altomira. This is Portalrubio de Guadamejud at 810 metres, a village so small that the baker from Guadamejud, six kilometres away, still makes a weekly delivery.

Twenty-eight souls remain on the municipal register, though you'd be lucky to spot half that number on a weekday in February. The rest of the houses—whitewashed cubes with timber balconies and green-painted doors—stand shuttered, waiting for August when grandchildren arrive with Madrid licence plates and the plaza fills with plastic chairs and card games that last until the temperature drops.

Following Cela's Footsteps Through Empty Streets

Camilo José Cela passed this way in 1946, notebook in hand, cataloguing the slow decline of rural Spain. Little has changed. The calle Real still measures barely 300 metres from the ruined threshing floors at the northern edge to the last house before the drop into the Rambla de Valdemembra. Along it you'll find the usual markers of a Castilian hill village: the stone water trough dry since the 1980s, the former schoolhouse (now the mayor's weekend retreat), and a bar that opens only when someone remembers to restock the beer fridge.

Architecture buffs will appreciate the masonry. Granite quoins frame doorways recycled from Roman milestones. Cornerstones carry mason's marks dating back to the Reconquista. Yet there's no museum ticket office, no gift shop selling fridge magnets. The heritage is simply there, part of the fabric, which makes a change from the audio-guide experience of better-known destinations.

Walk the alley behind the church and you'll reach a mirador where the land falls away sharply. On clear days you can pick out the white cluster of Villalgordo del Marquesado twelve kilometres distant. Vultures use the same thermal; they ride it lazily, scanning for carrion among the almond groves that stitch together the terraced fields below.

What the Plains Actually Offer

The surrounding páramo looks monotonous only to the impatient. In April the stonecrop blooms yellow between the slate shards, and bee-eaters return to nest in the riverbank. By late June the cereal stubble glints like brass, and the air carries the smell of dried thyme crushed underfoot. October brings migrant hawkers—dragonflies that drift south along the same flyway used by honey buzzards.

There are no signed trails, which is either liberating or unnerving depending on your map-reading confidence. The GR-160 long-distance footpath skirts the village boundary, but most visitors simply follow the farm tracks west towards the abandoned hamlet of Valdeminguete. Allow ninety minutes; take water, as the only fuente marked on the 1:50,000 topographic map dried up years ago. Phone reception is patchy beyond the cemetery—download offline maps before setting out.

Cyclists arrive in spring for the secondary road that loops through Guadamejud and Zafrilla. The gradient never exceeds 4%, but the surface ripples like corrugated iron where winter frosts have lifted the tarmac. Mountain bikers can link a 45-kilometre circuit using the dirt roads that service the wind turbines on the ridge; expect loose marl and the occasional guard dog protecting somebody's grapevines.

Eating (or Not) in the Alcarria

Portalrubio itself has no restaurant, no shop, no ATM. The last village grocery closed when Doña Mercedes retired in 2013. Plan accordingly. The nearest proper supermarket is the Coello chain in Campillo de Altobuey, twenty minutes by car. If you're staying in one of the two village cottages available for short lets, bring provisions before you leave the A-3 motorway.

For a sit-down meal you'll drive to Guadamejud where Casa Ascensión serves gazpacho pastor (a hearty mutton stew thickened with flatbread) and morteruelo, the pâté-like spread that tastes better than it looks. Weekend lunch costs €16 for three courses, bread and a carafe of house wine poured from an unlabelled jug. They close Thursday and don't take cards.

The area's real edible treasure is honey. Buy it directly from the beekeeper whose sign reads "Miel Alcarria – Se Vende" opposite the petrol station in Villalba de la Sierra. The wildflower version sets hard and smells of rosemary; the chestnut honey stays runny and carries a faint bitterness that works well on toast with unsalted butter.

When to Come, When to Stay Away

March and April deliver daytime temperatures around 18°C and skies scrubbed clean by Atlantic fronts. The village well fills after winter rain, and almond blossom photographs beautifully against the limestone walls. Accommodation prices remain at low-season levels, though you'll need to book the self-catering cottage well ahead if Easter falls early—Madrid families treat the place as a second home.

July and August turn the plains into a pizza oven. Thermometers touch 38°C by mid-afternoon; the only shade is inside the church or beneath the single plane tree in the plaza. Even the swifts stop screaming and hunt higher where the air is cooler. August fiestas bring fireworks, brass bands and a temporary bar that sells overpriced lager to visitors who've forgotten what Spanish beer costs in a real village.

Winter is not for the faint-hearted. The 810-metre altitude means night frosts from October onwards; snow arrives two or three times each season and cuts the access road until the council tractor clears a single track. Heating in the rental houses runs on butane cylinders that empty fast if you insist on T-shirt temperatures indoors. On the plus side, the light turns crystalline, and you might have the entire horizon to yourself.

Getting Here Without Tears

Public transport is theoretical. The Monday-to-Friday bus between Cuenca and Teruel can drop you at the junction of the CM-210, six kilometres below the village, but you'll need to phone for a taxi that may or may not materialise. Hiring a car at Madrid Barajas remains the sensible option; take the A-3 to kilometre 174, then follow the CM-210 for 22 twisting kilometres. Allow 2 hours 15 minutes from Terminal 4—longer if you obey the 90 km/h limit through the national park where Guardia Civil hide behind the oleander.

Fill the tank in Tarancón; the village has no petrol station and the nearest pumps close on Sunday afternoons. While you're at it, check the spare tyre. Agricultural debris—straw stubble that pierces rubber like nails—litters the back roads after harvest.

Portalrubio de Guadamejud will never feature on a glossy regional tourist board campaign. It offers no swimming pool, no artisan brewery, no yoga retreat. What it does provide is an unfiltered dose of rural Spain at its most honest: silence punctuated by church bells, neighbours who nod even when they don't know you, and a landscape that changes colour faster than British weather. Bring a book, sturdy shoes and realistic expectations. The village will handle the rest.