Neila de San Miguel

The church bell tolls eleven times, but only six voices drift from the bar-less square. At 1,164 metres above sea level, Neila de San Miguel operates on its own arithmetic: more stone cottages than year-round residents, more shepherd huts than Sunday worshippers, and certainly more grazing sheep than passing cars.

This granite hamlet, strung across a ridge in the Sierra de Ávila, never reached the critical mass that earns a place on the tourist circuit. The road from Piedrahíta winds upwards for 19 kilometres, past oak dehesas where black Iberian pigs sniff for acorns, before depositing visitors at a junction where three streets meet and promptly give up. There's no petrol station, no cash machine, and the nearest shop sits fourteen kilometres away in El Barco de Ávila. What exists is altitude-thinned air, a horizon that stretches to the Gredos peaks, and the particular silence that makes city dwellers speak in whispers.

Stone, Slate and Seasonal Migration

The village architecture reads like a practical manual on highland survival. Granite walls, two feet thick, keep January nights at bay when temperatures drop to minus eight. Arabic tiles, fired in local kilns, shrug off Atlantic storms that roll in from the west. Each house hugs its neighbour, creating wind-breaks along lanes barely wide enough for a tractor. The effect isn't quaint—it's necessary. Winters here last five months, and the first snow can arrive before Halloween.

Walk the single street at dusk and you'll spot the tell-tale signs of a place that nearly emptied. Freshly pointed mortar beside ancient stone shows where returnees have resurrected family homes. Madrid number plates appear on weekends, belonging to grandchildren who fled during Spain's industrial boom. They arrive with supermarket bags from the capital, because Neila's last grocer closed when democracy was still new. The rhythm is familiar across rural Castilla y León: Easter gardening, August fiestas, Christmas chimney smoke, then nine months of locked shutters.

Summer brings a different calculus. August temperatures hover around twenty-four degrees—cool enough that Madrileños ditch air-conditioning for mountain breezes. The population swells, perhaps, to eighty. Someone unlocks the village fountain; another resident mows the plaza. For three weeks, Neila feels almost busy. Then September mist rolls in, and the exodus resumes.

Walking Without Waymarks

Forget branded trails and interpretive panels. Footpaths here pre-date the concept of leisure hiking—they connect pastures, water sources, and neighbours who traded vegetables long before organic became fashionable. From the church door, a farm track drops south-east towards the Neila River, crossing meadows where cowbells provide the only soundtrack. Forty minutes of gentle descent reaches a stone bridge, widened in 1952 after floods swept away the original. Turn back, or continue another hour to abandoned shepherd huts where wall-nesting red-rumped swallows dive through empty windows.

The more adventurous can follow the ridge westward towards the Puerto de Chía. The route gains 300 metres over three kilometres, threading between boulder fields and juniper scrub. On clear days, the view encompasses five provinces: Ávila's rolling granitic batholith, Salamanca's distant wheat plains, even the snow-capped peaks of the Sierra de Béjar. Bring water—there's none en route, and summer sun at this altitude dehydrates faster than coastal heat.

Navigation requires basic Spanish: ask any resident for "el camino de los arrieros" and receive a wave towards the livestock trail that once funnelled merino sheep towards winter pastures in Extremadura. The path exists because thousands of hooves wore it down, not because a tourism board saw pound signs.

What Passes for Gastronomy

Neila doesn't do restaurants. The closest dining sits seventeen kilometres away in Piedrahíta, where Mesón El Cazador serves judiones—buttery giant white beans stewed with chorizo—for €12. Plan accordingly. Most visitors pack picnics, buying supplies in El Barco's Saturday market where Vicente's stall still weighs tomatoes on brass scales older than his customers.

Those staying in self-catering cottages can source local beef directly from farmers. Ask at number 23—Manolo keeps Aberdeen Angus crosses that graze the high meadows. A kilo of mince costs €8, half supermarket prices, and comes with cooking tips plus a lecture on why Spanish agriculture is doomed. The village's single bar, open sporadically on weekends, stocks Mahou beer and little else. Payment is cash-only; they haven't seen a chip-and-pin machine since 2006.

Beds, Broadband and Bureaucracy

Accommodation options reflect the demographic reality. La Covatilla offers four rooms in a converted barn, underfloor heating included—essential when October nights dip below five degrees. Rates start at €70 including breakfast, served at the only table that overlooks the valley. Alternatively, NeilaRural provides a two-bedroom cottage with wood-burner and English-speaking host, useful when the boiler inevitably speaks only Spanish. Both places close January through March; owners can't be bothered heating empty rooms for non-existent guests.

Mobile signal depends on wind direction. Vodafone works near the church tower; Orange users must climb 200 metres eastward and face north-east like human weather vanes. Wi-Fi exists but operates on copper lines laid during Spain's EU infrastructure boom—fine for emails, hopeless for Netflix. Consider this a feature, not a bug.

The Honest Season

Spring arrives late and brief. May transforms the high meadows into a patchwork of yellow broom and purple viper's bugloss, but night frosts can strike until mid-June. Walking conditions peak during two narrow windows: late May for wildflowers, and mid-September when morning mists burn off to reveal 50-kilometre views. Outside these periods, weather turns adversarial. October delivers Atlantic storms that whip across treeless ridges; February snowdrifts cut road access for days. The Ayuntamiento keeps a single plough—if it breaks, you're walking out.

Come anyway, but adjust expectations. Neila rewards those seeking subtraction rather than addition: fewer people, less noise, minimal infrastructure. The village offers no Instagram moments—just granite walls that have witnessed four centuries of marginal farming, and shepherds who still move livestock on foot because the lanes are too narrow for lorries. Bring waterproof boots, a sense of self-sufficiency, and enough petrol to reach the nearest functioning petrol station. The bell will toll regardless of whether anyone listens.