Medinilla

The church bell strikes eleven and the only other sound is a tractor grinding through lower gear somewhere beyond the stone houses. At 1,066 metres above sea level, Medinilla sits just high enough for the air to feel thinner than Madrid’s, yet low enough for the Sierra de Ávila to loom overhead like a granite wall. Eighty-odd souls live here year-round, a number that swells to perhaps a hundred and twenty when August returnees fill the family houses whose shutters stay shut most of the year.

Stone, Wind and Winter Firewood

Every wall in the village is thick enough to swallow a doorway—an architecture built for February nights that drop to –8 °C. Adobe and granite absorb the day’s heat, then release it slowly after the sun slips behind the ridge. Rooflines sit low, chimneys puff steadily from October to April, and the village’s single fountain still runs even when the surrounding fields freeze solid. Locals time their day by daylight and firewood supply rather than smartphone alerts; if the stack beside the house looks short, the morning starts with axe work before coffee.

There is no high street, no gift shop, no Saturday market. Instead, three narrow lanes meet at a triangle of concrete that functions as both plaza and car park. The church, its stone belfry patched with cement the colour of wet sand, keeps its doors unlocked only on Sunday mornings and fiesta days. Step inside and the temperature drops another degree; the Baroque altarpiece glints with gold paint that has been retouched so often the saints’ faces look slightly surprised.

Walking Without Waymarks

Maps call the surrounding landscape “transitional dehesa”, a halfway zone between cereal plateau and proper mountain forest. Holm oaks and younger chestnuts scatter across pasture that turns from emerald in May to pale biscuit by July. There are no signed footpaths, yet the web of farm tracks is easy to follow if you remember two rules: uphill leads to the Sierra, downhill leads back to the village, and any junction with fresh tractor tyre prints is worth taking.

A ninety-minute loop eastward climbs gently to the ridge at 1,300 metres, where the view opens south toward the Gredos cirque, still white until late May. On the return leg the track passes an abandoned grain store; its oak beams have sagged like an old horse’s back and swallow nests clog the rafters. Bring water—there is no bar at the top—and expect mobile reception to vanish within the first kilometre. That is the point, really.

Spring brings wild peonies along the ditches; autumn carpets the paths with crisp brown chestnut leaves that hide ankle-turning holes left by wild boar. After heavy snow the village is cut off for a day or two; the council tractor clears the AV-931 first, then the side lane to the cemetery, and only afterwards the handful of tracks walkers actually use.

What You Will Not Find (and Where to Find It)

Medinilla has no restaurant, no cash machine, no petrol station. The nearest loaf of bread is seven kilometres away in El Barco de Ávila, a market town with two small supermarkets and a bakery that shuts on Mondays. Fill the tank there, not here; the single village pump dispenses agricultural diesel only and the owner keeps the key.

Meals happen behind closed doors. If you are staying in one of the two village houses rented to visitors, cook with local beef bought from the brown-and-white farm on the northern edge—ring the bell after 6 pm when the family is back from the fields. Expect to pay around €14 a kilo for hindquarter cuts, trimmed and wrapped in white paper still warm from the beast. Mushroom season (April and late October) brings neighbours out at dawn with wicker baskets; join them only if you can tell a níspero from a deadly galerina.

For a sit-down lunch, drive twenty minutes south to Puerto Castilla, where Casa Paco grills T-bones over holm-oak coals and serves wine in white ceramic bowls. A three-course menú del día costs €14.50 including coffee, but arrive before two o’clock or the dining room fills with lorry drivers who know the owner by nickname.

August Fires and Winter Silence

The calendar here has two settings. Winter runs from October to May, when lights go out by ten and the wind funnels up the valley sounding like distant traffic that never arrives. Summer compresses into five hectic weeks: the fiestas patronales around 15 August, the day the village fountain is decorated with geraniums, and the makeshift bar in the plaza sells €1 bottles of beer cooled in a plastic drum.

Returnees roll up in Madrid-plated 4x4s, greet cousins they last saw at the previous funeral, and argue over who left the balcony shutters unpainted. A brass band arrives from Piedrahíta, plays three songs, then retires to the bar for brandy. At midnight a volunteer wheels out a rusted fireworks frame; the display lasts seven minutes and sets fire to next-door’s walnut tree. No one apologises; the tree survives, and next year the same neighbour donates the walnuts for the tarta de la fiesta.

Getting There, Staying Warm

From London, fly to Madrid, then take the ALSA coach to Ávila (1 hr 30 min) and pick up a hire car—essential, as buses serve Medinilla only on market days. The final 45 km drive follows the A-50 toll road to Ávila, then the N-502 mountain highway. In winter carry snow chains even if the forecast promises blue sky; weather flips within an hour at this altitude.

Accommodation is limited. The village’s two rental houses sleep six and four respectively; both have wood-burning stoves and charge €90–€110 per night, two-night minimum. Bring slippers—the stone floors are beautiful and glacial. The nearest hotel is in El Barco de Ávila, a 15-minute drive down a winding road that ices over first. Book ahead for May and October weekends; bird-watchers and Madrid families after cheap country air block out rooms months early.

The Honest Verdict

Medinilla will not change your life. It offers no epiphany, no trending hashtag, no souvenir beyond the scent of woodsmoke in your jacket. What it does provide is a calibrated sense of scale: hills that look manageable until you walk them, skies that feel larger because there is nothing much underneath, evenings that end when the fire burns low rather than when the bar shuts. Come if you want to remember how quiet the world can be; stay away if you need someone else to entertain you. Bring good shoes, a sense of self-sufficiency and, in winter, a coat you do not mind smelling of roasted chestnuts for weeks afterwards.