Lillo

The parachutes appear first—bright dots spiralling down from 13,000 feet, landing with a soft thud beside the cereal fields that surround Lillo. It's an arresting sight: adrenaline junkies from Madrid tumbling through the same sky that Cervantes once described as "a clear expanse of sapphire" over La Mancha. Most visitors whizz past on the A-4, bound for Andalucía, never realising that this modest village of 2,500 souls doubles as mainland Spain's highest sky-diving drop zone.

Skydive Lillo operates at weekends, weather permitting. A tandem jump costs €220 and requires advance booking; spectators watch free from the picnic tables outside the hangar. The centre brings a trickle of international custom—British stag parties, French solo jumpers, Madrid office crews on jollies—yet by 7pm the car park empties and Lillo reverts to its natural tempo. That tempo is slow, deliberate, shaped by altitude and agriculture. At 684 metres, nights stay cooler than the Meseta floor below; morning mists linger longer, burnished by sun that turns the brick tower of Nuestra Señora de la Asuncion the colour of toasted almonds.

Brick, Mudejar and a Plaza that Still Works

Approach the village from the CM-412 and the tower dominates long before any houses come into view. Fourteen metres of 14th-century brickwork, laced with horseshoe arches and sebka patterns, rise in tapering stages—more minaret than belfry. Locals call it "the cathedral made of nougat"; from close-up the mortar seams look almost good enough to slice. Inside, the nave feels disproportionately grand for a place this size, the result of 16th-century nobles funnelling New World silver into their home parish. Swivel your gaze upwards and you'll spot a tiny museum cabinet: a Roman coin, a fragment of Visigothic slate, proof that people have been pinning their hopes on this ridge for well over a thousand years.

Step back outside and you're in Plaza de España, still the functional heart of town. Grandmothers park shopping trolleys beside the 16th-century Rollo de Justicia—a stone pillory once used to bind petty criminals—while they discuss tomorrow's weather forecast. There's only one bar, La Parrilla, so everyone passes through sooner or later. Coffee costs €1.20, served in glass tumblers; they will bring a free churro at weekends if you order before noon. No one rushes you, but don't expect Wi-Fi; the signal drops the moment you sit down.

Walking the Meseta Without the Crowds

Lillo sits on a gentle rise, which means every path out of town delivers a horizon that seems to curve like the edge of the world. The GR-139 long-distance footpath skirts the village boundary; follow it east for 40 minutes and you reach the ruins of the Knights of Santiago watch-post, Cerro de San Cristóbal. From the crest you can see the outline of Toledo cathedral 70km away—clear days only, usually after rain. Spring brings a brief, dazzling window when the wheat is green and poppies smear scarlet between the rows; by July the palette has shifted to gold and ochre, the air shimmers at 38°C and sensible people mimic the locals: errands before 11am, siesta, re-emerge at 8pm.

Cyclists appreciate the empty CM county roads that grid the plateau. A 35km loop north through Noblejas and back via Ciruelos is pancake-flat, traffic-free except for the occasional tractor hauling irrigation pipe. Hire bikes through Skydive Lillo (€25/day) or bring your own; spares are non-existent in the village, so carry inner tubes and plenty of water—shade is scarce and the breeze can mislead you into underestimating dehydration.

Bird-watchers fare better than expected. Drive five minutes south at dawn, pull off at the first unsurfaced track, wait beside the fallow field with a pair of binoculars. Great bustards—birds the size of a labrador—strut between the furrows; little bustards, pin-tailed sandgrouse and hen harriers patrol further off. You need patience and a telescope to distinguish the females, but the spectacle of a male bustard inflating his white throat feathers in April is worth the 5am alarm. No hides, no entrance fee, no guarantees: just you and the steppe.

Calories and Clocks: Eating on La Mancha Time

Gastronomy here is calibrated to fieldwork. Breakfast is coffee-and-cake at 10am; the main meal lands between 2pm and 4pm, after which kitchens close. Turn up at 6pm expecting tapas and you'll find metal shutters. Plan accordingly.

Restaurante La Casita, on Calle San Pedro, serves a fixed lunch menu for €12 Monday to Friday: pisto manchego (a mellow ratatouille topped with fried egg), followed by caldereta de cordero—lamb stew thick enough to stand a spoon in. House wine from Valdepeñas arrives chilled in a plain glass jug; ask for "clarete" if you prefer the light, almost rosé style that locals drink at midday. Vegetarians survive on pisto and the occasional tortilla; vegans should self-cater.

The Tuesday morning market stocks Manchego cheese at farm-gate prices: €8 a kilo for curado, €6 for semi. Buy a wedge, add a crusty barra from Panadería San Roque (opens 6.30am, sold out by 1pm) and you've got picnic material for the long drive south. Keep an eye out for jars of local honey labelled "mil flores"; the thyme-scented version disappears fastest.

When to Drop In—and When to Drive On

Lillo works best as a one-night pause between Madrid and Granada, or as a low-cost base for a long weekend of sky-diving and walking. Spring (mid-March to mid-May) and early autumn (September-October) deliver 22°C afternoons and cool bedrooms; you'll need a jumper after sunset whatever the season. August is punishingly hot; the village empties as families decamp to the coast, and the only place serving food may be the petrol-station café on the A-4 slip road.

Getting here without a car is possible but masochistic. Buses leave Madrid's Estación Sur at 15:30 on weekdays, reaching Lillo at 17:45; the return departs 6:45 next morning. That timetable leaves you 13 hours—ample for a parachute jump and a plate of migas, but useless if the weather grounds aircraft. Hire wheels at the airport instead; the drive is 95 minutes down the A-4, exit 98, then 12km of empty country road. Fill the tank before you leave the motorway—Lillo's single fuel pump closes at 9pm and all day Sunday.

Evenings are quiet. Apart from the parish choir practising on Thursdays and dominoes clacking in the bar, entertainment is self-generated. Bring a book, stroll the floodlit plaza, listen for the stone-coloured lesser noctule bats that chatter above the tower. Mobile reception is patchy inside the historic core; download offline maps and tell your friends you'll ring them back when you're on the roof terrace—where, under one of Europe's last dark skies, the Milky Way looks close enough to snag a parachute on.