Tordesilos

The stone houses appear to grow from the hillside itself, their slate roofs catching the morning light at an angle that makes the whole village look briefly metallic. At 1,345 metres above sea level, Tordesilos is higher than Ben Nevis's base-to-summit climb, and the air carries that particular quality mountain dwellers recognise immediately: thin, sharp, and tasting faintly of pine resin and cold iron.

The Arithmetic of Emptiness

Ninety-three souls. That's the official count, though on any given weekday you'll struggle to spot more than a dozen. The maths of depopulation plays out here with brutal clarity: each house represents not just shelter abandoned, but a family tree uprooted, a lineage that once kept sheep, harvested almonds, and knew which mushrooms wouldn't kill you. The remaining neighbours have an average age hovering around sixty-seven, and they've developed the habit of counting cars that pass through the single main street. Three yesterday meant a busy day.

The village sits perched on Guadalajara's eastern edge, where Castilla-La Mancha bleeds into Aragón across ridges that once served as smuggling routes. Madrid lies 160 kilometres west, close enough that weekenders could theoretically visit, yet far enough that most don't bother. Those who do arrive find mobile phone signal that vanishes near the church tower, and shops that shut for lunch at 1pm sharp regardless of potential customers.

Stone, Wood, and the Art of Staying Put

San Pedro's church squats at the village centre like a weather-beaten toad, its Romanesque bones visible beneath eighteenth-century plaster. Inside, the temperature drops ten degrees immediately; stone walls thick as a London terraced house's width have been absorbing summer heat and winter cold for four centuries. The altar cloth shows Saint Peter attempting to walk on water with the distinct air of someone who's read the health and safety briefing and decided to proceed anyway.

Wandering the lanes reveals construction techniques that predate building regulations. Houses lean into hillsides, their ground floors built for livestock now converted into tool storage or left to gather the dust of decades. Wooden balconies, called miradores, jut at angles that seem to defy physics, supported by beams hand-hewn from local pines. Granite blocks show tool marks from quarries that closed before Victoria took the throne, fitted together without mortar in sections where the original builders apparently trusted gravity more than lime.

Photographers arrive expecting ruin porn and find something more complex: a village negotiating its own obsolescence. Windows boarded with corrugated iron sit beside others sporting fresh paint and geraniums. The contrast isn't photogenic decay but stubborn persistence, the visual equivalent of someone continuing to set the table for dinner while the house burns.

Walking Where the Wild Things Are

The GR-90 long-distance path passes within two kilometres, though you'd need local knowledge to find the connection. From the village fountain, an unmarked track leads north-east through sabine forests where Spanish imperial eagles nest in cliffs that drop suddenly into the Tajo valley. Walkers should carry water; streams marked on Ordnance Survey-equivalent maps dried up in the 1998 drought and never returned.

Morning walks offer the best wildlife spotting. Red deer move through the tree line at dawn, their coats the exact colour of last autumn's leaves. Wild boar root around abandoned almond groves; their digging creates perfect ankle-turning hazards hidden beneath last night's windfall. The boar have learnt to associate human scent with abandoned agricultural bounty, and they'll tolerate observers at thirty metres provided you stay downwind and remain quieter than a Brexit negotiation.

Summer hikers should start early. By 11am the sun turns these slopes into natural pizza ovens, and shade becomes theoretical rather than actual. The altitude tricks visitors into thinking 25°C feels manageable, until they discover the ultraviolet index operates at Mediterranean levels. Sensible walkers carry more water than they think necessary and hats that actually shade necks, not just the trendy nonsense sold in Covent Garden.

Eating What the Land Remembers

Food here follows lunar cycles more than market trends. When the wild asparagus appears in April, everyone eats asparagus. When the boar population explodes, pork features in every meal for weeks. The village's single bar opens randomly; calling ahead involves shouting across the valley to see if María's light is on.

Local specialities arrive unannounced. Migas appears when the bread goes stale, fried with garlic and whatever meat needs using. The resulting dish tastes of smoke and thrift, with texture varying from gravel to porridge depending on the cook's mood. Tortas de chicharrones sound appealing until you realise you're eating essentially pork scratchings held together with pig fat and flour, a heart attack disguised as pastry.

The nearest proper restaurant sits twelve kilometres away in Molina de Aragón, where the castle's restaurant serves lamb that spent its life wandering these very hills. Expect to pay €18 for cordero asado that would cost £35 in Borough Market, served by waiters who've been doing this since Franco was alive and see no reason to change now.

Seasons of Silence and Sudden Life

Winter arrives suddenly, usually between one Tuesday afternoon and Wednesday morning. The first snow transforms the village into a monochrome photograph, all sharp angles and soft edges. Roads become impassable within hours; locals keep chains in car boots from October onwards and consider anyone who doesn't frankly suicidal. The silence deepens to physical pressure, broken only by church bells that seem to ring for the entire province.

Spring brings the return of the swallows, though here they're actually house martins. They arrive in March and immediately begin repairing nests built into eaves older than the United States. Their chatter replaces television for many residents, who can read weather forecasts in the birds' flight patterns with accuracy that would shame the Met Office.

The fiesta of San Pedro, last weekend in June, triples the population temporarily. Emigrants return from Zaragoza, Barcelona, even Bradford, transforming quiet lanes into impromptu reunions. The single street fills with smoke from communal barbecues, and someone always brings fireworks banned since 1992 that explode in colours not found in nature. By Monday afternoon everyone's gone, leaving only discarded napkins and the lingering smell of churros to prove the celebration happened at all.

The Practical Business of Visiting

Getting here requires commitment. The nearest train station, Calatayud, sits 65 kilometres away and boasts two daily services from Madrid. Car hire becomes essential; budget €40 daily plus the cost of whatever damage the mountain roads inflict on suspension designed for Milton Keynes roundabouts. Driving from Madrid takes two and a half hours via the A-2, then progressively scarier roads until the final twelve kilometres require nerves of steel and possibly a religious conversion.

Accommodation means either the village's single rental house, sleeping four at €60 nightly, or camping wild with permission from the mayor (found most mornings at the bar if open). The house includes heating that works on winter nights when temperatures drop to -8°C, and a roof terrace perfect for watching stars bright enough to read by. Bring groceries; the nearest shop worth the name operates in Castejón de las Armas, twenty-two kilometres of mountain driving away.

Visit in late September when the heat's gone but snow hasn't arrived, and the rowan trees turn traffic-light red against stone walls. Stay two nights maximum unless you crave the kind of solitude that makes you count individual pine needles for entertainment. Leave before you start recognising individual sheep, but after you've learnt that silence here isn't absence but presence wearing different clothes.

The village will still be here next year, and the year after. Whether that's promise or threat depends entirely on what you're running from, and whether ninety-three people feel like company or isolation.