Almajano

At 1,020 metres above sea level, Almajano’s weather app is usually one step ahead of the valley. Dawn can be two degrees cooler than in Soria, 30 km away, and the wind arrives with the sincerity of someone who has nothing to prove. The village sits on a gentle rise in the Campo de Gómara, a plateau of wheat and barley that changes colour every six weeks like a slow-turning kaleidoscope. Less than 200 people live here permanently, which means the horizon is almost always wider than the crowd.

Stone, Straw and the Sound of Space

Houses are built from the two things the land gives in abundance: stone and straw-coloured adobe. Wooden gates hang on forged iron hinges that squeal a semitone lower in winter; chimneys are topped with curved tiles to stop the draught from reversing. There is no formal museum, so memory lives in the masonry. Look up and you’ll see dates chiselled into lintels—1894, 1821, sometimes just “A.M.” for the mason who never learned to carve his full name. The parish church, dedicated to St Peter, squats at the top of the single main street; its bell rings the hour twice, once for the living and once for whoever is working the fields out of sight.

The fields themselves are reached by lanes wide enough for a tractor and a dog. Wheat, barley and sunflowers alternate in a rotation older than the EU, leaving strips of fallow land that turn emerald after rain. Walk two kilometres east and you reach the abandoned hamlet of Las Ranas—roofless houses, a threshing circle still pressed into the earth, and silence that feels almost aquatic after the constant breeze.

Why You Notice the Altitude

The air is thin enough that a brisk walk from the church to the grain silo can leave an unprepared visitor breathing through the mouth. Summer midday temperatures hover around 28 °C instead of the 34 °C recorded down in the Duero basin, and nights drop to 14 °C—perfect for sleeping under a single wool blanket. In winter the village is frequently the coldest place in Soria province: –8 °C is routine, –15 °C not worth a headline. Snow arrives properly two or three times a season and lingers just long enough to make the road home slippery, not impossible.

That altitude also shapes the calendar. Seed goes into the ground later, harvest starts later, and the autumn mushroom season is compressed into three frantic weeks when boletus and níscalos push up through the pine litter in the nearby Sierra de Santa Ana. Collecting them is legal only with a €5 day permit bought online in advance; the local council patrols the tracks and fines start at €300. If you don’t fancy the paperwork, the bar in the next village, Tardelcuende, sells bags of locally picked ceps on the honour system: take a bag, leave €12 in the jar.

Walking Without Way-markers

There are no branded long-distance trails, which means you rarely meet anyone except the farmer on his quad bike checking sprinkler pipes. A good morning circuit is to follow the unpaved road past the cemetery, drop down to the seasonal river Gómara, then loop back past the solar farm—7 km, flat, with skylarks for company. If you want a half-day outing, continue north to the ruined Ermita de San Saturio; the chapel walls still stand, smothered in honeysuckle, and the view south takes in four distinct shades of cereal gold.

Carry water: the only fountain is in the village square and the next bar is 5 km away. Mobile coverage is patchy; Vodafone disappears completely behind the grain silo, Movistar hangs on with one bar. A paper map is lighter than a power bank and considerably less stressful.

Eating What the Land Paid For

Almajano has no restaurant, but the ayuntamiento keeps a list of three households licensed to cook for visitors—ring 48 hours ahead. Expect lamb shoulder slow-roasted with garlic and bay, a bowl of judiones (buttery white beans from La Bañeza), and a half-litre of young Ribera del Duero that costs less than a London espresso. Pudding is usually cuajada, sheep’s-milk curd with honey, served in the same earthenware dish it set in.

If you prefer self-catering, the tiny grocer opens weekday mornings. Stock is random: tinned tuna, tinned tomatoes, locally made chorizo, and on Fridays fresh eggs sold from a cardboard box on the counter. Bread arrives in a white van at 11:00; by 11:20 it is gone. Bring sturdy vegetables from Soria if you plan to cook—lettuce wilts in the time it takes to carry it from car to kitchen.

When the Village Doubles in Size

Fiestas patronales begin on the last weekend of August. The population jumps to roughly 400 as emigrants return from Zaragoza, Barcelona and, in one case, Milton Keynes. A sound system is erected in the square, foam plates of paella circulate at cost price, and on Sunday morning everyone walks behind the brass band to the church. The procession is short—five minutes, enough time for the priest to bless the fields and for two tractors to rev in approval—then the band strikes up a pasodoble and the bar opens again. If you want to sleep before 02:00, book a house on the edge of the village; the square does not quieten until the generator runs out of diesel.

Winter is the opposite. From November to March the streets are empty by 21:00. Bars in neighbouring villages close on Tuesdays and Thursdays; plan your beer accordingly. Yet January brings its own visitors: astronomy students from the University of Valladolid who set up telescopes on the football pitch. At this altitude and distance from city glow the Milky Way is a visible stripe, not a metaphor, and shooting stars leave bronze scars across the sky.

Getting Here, Staying Here

There is no rail line and no regular bus. From the UK the sanest route is to fly to Madrid, pick up a hire car, and head north on the A-2 to Medinaceli, then west on the N-122 to Soria; the turn-off to Almajano is signposted five kilometres after the service station with the giant bull silhouette. Total driving time from Terminal 4 is two hours, but allow longer if the A-2 is busy with lorries feeding Madrid’s building sites.

Accommodation inside the village amounts to three rural cottages booked through the regional tourist board website. Expect stone floors, wood-burning stoves, and Wi-Fi that works until the wind swings north. Prices hover around €90 a night for two people, minimum stay two nights in high season. If you prefer a conventional hotel, the Parador de Soria sits on the city’s north ridge 25 minutes away—ask for a room facing the Duero gorge and you can watch the sunset colour the cliffs while enjoying a gin-tonic made with local sloe liqueur.

Leave the Superlatives at Home

Almajano will not change your life. It offers no Michelin stars, no souvenir shops, no ancient murals to photograph. What it does give is measurable in metres: 1,020 of altitude, 360 degrees of horizon, and about two hundred neighbours who will know your car registration by the second day. Turn up with sturdy shoes, a sense of seasonal rhythm, and a willingness to accept that the evening entertainment is the sky turning from brass to copper. Then the village does its quiet thing—makes London feel slightly louder than necessary when you go back.