Vega del Codorno

The morning church bell rings at eight, but nobody rushes. At 1,340 metres above sea level, Vega del Codorno's clock runs on mountain time: the goats appear when they fancy, the baker drives up from Tragacete when the van starts, and the pine smoke from breakfast stoves hangs longer in the thin air. With 132 permanent residents and a single paved road in, the village is less a destination than a pause button.

Stone houses shoulder together along the ridge, their timber doors painted the same ox-blood red the council's used since the 1950s. Corrals for chickens and the odd donkey are built into the ground floors, exactly as they were when mules, not Seat Ibizas, supplied the place. Walk the length of the settlement in ten minutes and you will have seen every street; keep walking past the last cottage and the tarmac gives way to a shepherd's track that meanders into the Serranía de Cuenca. The village boundary is marked not by a sign but by silence: when the cicadas stop, you have left.

What passes for a high street

There isn't one. The nearest approximation is Bar-Restaurante El Rincón, open when the owner's television isn't too interesting. Order a café con leche and you will get a glass of milk with a thimble of espresso on the side; the price is still €1.20 because nobody has bothered to update the till. Next door, the village shop doubles as the post office and sells tinned sardines, briquettes, and, on Thursdays, fresh trout brought up from the Cuervo river. Bring cash—the card machine "only works when it's warm".

Across the lane, the seventeenth-century church of San Pedro watches over the only bit of flat ground big enough for a game of football. Its bell tower leans two degrees after the 1917 earthquake; locals insist the tilt improves the acoustics. Inside, the altar cloth is embroidered with the names of every girl confirmed since 1949. The list is short enough to read in a single pew.

Walking without way-markers

Maps here are for guidance, not gospel. Three traditional drove roads braid through pine and juniper, linking Vega del Codorno to abandoned hamlets whose populations left for Valencia in the 1960s. Follow the middle path eastwards and after forty minutes the trees part to reveal the Río Cuervo, a stream narrow enough to hop across in September, loud enough to hear from two valleys away after spring rain. Griffon vultures circle overhead; their wingspan matches the length of a small car, a useful mental scale when you are trying to judge distance across empty plateau.

Boots are non-negotiable. The limestone breaks into plates sharp enough to slice trainer soles, and the local adders are shy but present. In May the slopes glow yellow with Spanish broom; by late October the same bushes rattle with seed pods that children use as improvised castanets. Winter brings snow serious enough for cross-country skis—drive up from Cuenca after a storm and the CM-2105 becomes a bob-run where goat tracks provide the only grip.

Eating what the sierra provides

Hotel Restaurante Río Cuervo is the only establishment with a printed menu, and even that changes if the cook's cousin fails to shoot any wild boar. The set lunch runs to three courses, water, and a quarter-bottle of wine for €14. Expect gachas manchegas (a thick paprika-spiced porridge once fed to shepherds), migas (fried breadcrumbs with garlic and grapes), and lamb chops the size of a child's forearm. Vegetarians get a tortilla de patatas and a sympathetic shrug.

Supper options shrink to whatever is left at El Rincón: perhaps a bowl of caldo, a clear broth heavy on chickpeas, served with a side of crisps. The house rule is that food stops when the television news starts at 21:00; arrive late and you will be offered cheese, bread, and honesty about how long the cook has been on her feet. The cheese, semi-cured from neighbouring Villalba de la Sierra, costs €6 a wedge and travels better than any souvenir key-ring.

Seasons that tell you what to do

April and May smell of resin and damp earth. Night temperatures still dip to 5 °C, so hotels leave blankets stacked in corridors like sandbags. Days are wind-brushed and bright, ideal for the 12-km loop that climbs to the Puerto de Vega then drops into the beech wood of Tejadillos. Mid-June brings thunderstorms that crack like artillery; paths turn to streams and the village fountain overflows, providing the only running water some houses enjoy.

August is the secret season. Spaniards flee the interior for the coast, leaving rooms available and prices soft. The trade-off is heat that feels personal—34 °C in the shade by 11:00—but ascend two hundred metres into the pines and the thermometer falls ten degrees. Evenings require a jacket; night skies are so clear that satellites outnumber planes.

October belongs to the mushroom hunter. Pine rings, niscalos (Lactarius deliciosus), and the prized boletus appear after the first autumn rain. Locals carry curved knives and know the exact tree; visitors need a permit (€5 from the town hall, open Tuesday mornings only). The same month hosts the matanza, the annual pig slaughter. Nobody advertises it, but if you wake to the smell of scalded bristle you have missed the polite moment to offer help.

Getting stuck, and getting out

Car hire is essential. The last bus left in 2011 when the council judged the road "excessive for a vehicle with forty seats". From Madrid Barajas, take the A-3 to Tarancón, then the N-420 to Cuenca; the final 45 minutes on the CM-2105 single-track climb will teach you Spanish curse words. Petrol pumps are 25 km away in Tragacete—fill up, because the hotel generator drinks diesel when winter gales fell power lines.

Phone coverage is patchy. Vodafone disappears at kilometre 18; EE survives a little longer if you stand on the church step. The hotel Wi-Fi password is "12345678a" and the router rests on the bar; buy a coffee and you may stream the BBC headlines at 360p. Otherwise, surrender to the original aeroplane mode.

The honest verdict

Vega del Codorno offers altitude without attitude. There are no gift shops, no guided tastings, no flamenco nights laid on for tour groups. What you get instead is space—geological, temporal, and acoustic—at a price that undercuts most European capitals. A double room with breakfast costs €60; a three-course lunch, €14; the silence after the bell stops, free.

Come if you want to walk until your phone dies, eat what the land killed or grew, and remember what stars looked like before light pollution. Do not come for nightlife unless your idea of after-dark entertainment involves bat detectors and brandy. If it rains, you will get muddy; if it snows, you may get stuck. Either way, the sierra will still be here when the roads clear, running on its own clock, indifferent and magnificent in equal measure.