Tejado

The church bell tolls twice and the only other sound is a Labrador’s claws on tarmac. At 989 metres above sea level, Tejado is high enough for your ears to pop on the drive up, yet the village itself takes four minutes to cross on foot. Eighty-six residents, one Romanesque tower, zero supermarkets. If you arrive on a February Tuesday you may complete the circuit without meeting a soul.

This is the Soria that guidebooks skip. No almond terraces, no Moorish walls—just cereal plains that roll like a calm Atlantic until the horizon buckles into the Montes de Gómara. Stone houses, most shuttered since September, shoulder the wind that scuds across Castile. Their roofs give the place its name—tejado, simply “roof”—and many are still topped with the region’s dark grey slate that turns silver after rain.

The Arithmetic of Silence

Come prepared: the last cash machine is 25 kilometres east in Soria city, the last petrol pump another ten beyond that. Mobile reception flickers. Fill the tank, buy water, and pack the ham sandwich you’ll crave by 14:00 because nothing opens here. The village has no bar, no shop, no resident priest; the church of San Miguel is unlocked only for its patronal weekend around 29 September, when the population quadruples and cousins sleep on sofa beds trucked in from Zaragoza.

That weekend is the closest Tejado gets to a crowd. On ordinary days the traffic census is three tractors and the weekly delivery lorry whose driver also sells bread from the passenger seat. Park on the bald patch beside the stone cross—no metres, no discs, no hassle—and start walking. Gravity does the navigation: every lane tilts toward the church tower that has oriented shepherds since the twelfth century.

A Half-Hour Loop that Stretches to Lunchtime

Begin at the era comunal, the communal threshing floor now used as an unofficial viewpoint. From its rim the plateau drops away in wheat rectangles that change colour with the calendar: acid green in April, ochre by July, rust after the October chop. Look north and you can trace the A-15 towards Logroño by the line of wind turbines glinting like fridge magnets.

Drop into the village proper. Notice the timber doors reinforced with iron roses, the haylofts converted into weekend studios, the sunflower-motif lintel dated 1764 that someone has painted custard yellow. Half the houses have been restored by returnee Madrilenians; the rest slump gently back into the ground, their roof beams exposed like broken ribs. Adobe walls bulge outward—earth returning to earth—while swallows stitch the gap with mud. The restoration crowd favour polished concrete floors and under-floor heating; the decaying houses smell of burnt toast and stable straw. Both versions are photogenic, just don’t expect either to sell you a postcard.

What Passes for Entertainment

Walking tracks radiate into the paramera, the high steppe. None are way-marked; all are obvious. Follow the farm track south for twenty minutes and you’ll reach an abandoned cortijo where storks have rebuilt the chimney into a nursery. Carry on another kilometre and the path dips into a barranco loud with nightingales in May, silent by September. Serious hikers can link a chain of empty hamlets—Aldealafuente, Fuentecantón, Tejado, Villaseca—forming a 14-kilometre loop that never drops below 950 metres. Take two litres of water; the only bar is back in Soria.

Birders arrive at dawn with thermos tea and seed-cake. The plains hold pin-tailed sandgrouse that fly in to drink at livestock troughs, and little bustards whose mating calls resemble a cracked hinge. Binoculars also catch hen harriers quartering the stubble, plus the resident pair of griffon vultures that circle over the rubbish skip—high-altitude hygiene service. Spring brings red poppies splashed across the verges like spilt paint; autumn brings fungi. Locals head for the pine relics beyond Dehesa de Tejado after the first October rain; if you tag along, remember Spaniards treat mushroom IDs like state secrets. Accept no invitation unless you fancy a stomach pump in Soria hospital.

Weather that Forgets the Season

Even in July the thermometer can stall at 24 °C, then plunge to 8 °C the moment the sun slips behind the Sierra. Pack the fleece you left in the hotel—altitude is impartial. Winter is brutal: the TE-V-9032 access road is gritted only as far as the grain co-op; after that you’re on your own. Snow settles in long furrows that the wind sculpts into frozen waves, pretty until you realise the elderly neighbour hasn’t been seen since Tuesday. Four-wheel drive is sensible from December to March; chains suffice the rest of the year.

Eating (Elsewhere)

There is no restaurant menu to photograph. The nearest sustenance is six kilometres away in Villaseca de Arciel, where Bar La Plaza serves a plate of torreznos—pork belly slow-fried until the rind shatters—for €6. Order “un corto” for a thimble of strong coffee, “una doble” if you slept in the car. Soria city, 35 minutes east, has Michelin-rated Asador Don José for roast milk-fed lamb at €38 a portion; book before you leave Britain because half of Valladolid arrives at weekends. Vegetarians should lower expectations: even the green beans come with jamón.

Where to Lay Your Head

You cannot sleep in Tejado. The last guest bed disappeared when the primary school closed in 1998. Instead, drive back to Soria and choose between the functional Alfonso VIII on Calle de los Parra (doubles €65, solid Wi-Fi, underground parking deep enough for a roof-box) or the clifftop Parador de Soria (doubles €130, panoramic terrace, Goyesca interiors). Both place you within ten minutes of the N-111 for tomorrow’s village hop. Camping is technically legal in the surrounding monte but wind will flay your tent before midnight; stick to brick walls.

The Honest Verdict

Tejado will not change your life. It offers no souvenir beyond the echo of your own boots and the realisation that half of inland Spain is quietly returning to the soil. What it does provide is a calibrated antidote to the Costas: space measured in kilometres, time marked by church bells, and the small thrill of self-sufficiency. Arrive expecting nothing more and you might leave with a strange reluctance to rejoin the motorway. Just remember to fill up before you climb—petrol, water, and, ideally, that ham sandwich.