Rioseco de Tapia

Stone, slate and silence

The first thing you notice is the quiet. Not the hush of a library, but the deeper absence made by 386 souls spread across six square kilometres of oak and sweet-chestnut slopes. Rioseco de Tapia sits at 953 m on the León side of the Cordillera Cantábrica, high enough for the air to carry a nip even in late May. Mobile signal flickers in and out like a faulty torch; when it drops, the only soundtrack is the clatter of a tractor on the LE-142 and the low argument of rooks in the church elm.

Houses are built for winter. Walls are granite, sixty centimetres thick, roofed with heavy slate that the wind can never lift. Balconies are narrow enough to touch across the lane, so neighbours can pass a ladder without leaving their bedrooms. Every dwelling still keeps its bread-oven, its wood-store, its stone stable now converted into a garage for a Citroën Berlingo. The effect is less “chocolate-box” than “working farmhouse someone forgot to modernise” – precisely the appeal.

What passes for a high street

There isn’t one. The village centre is a triangle of road where the church, the former school and the last bar once stood. The bar closed in 2019 when the owner retired; the school shut a decade earlier when rolls dropped below six. What remains is the 12th-century chapel of San Pedro, enlarged after a fire in 1743 and whitewashed inside so thoroughly that the fresco of Saint James looks startled, as if caught in headlights. Sunday Mass is at eleven; if the door is locked, ask in the house opposite – the key lives in a tobacco tin behind the water trough.

For supplies you drive twenty-five minutes to Sahagún, last outpost of petrol, cash and decent coffee. Until then, pack in. The only commerce is a meat-van that honks its horn on Tuesday mornings and a travelling baker whose arrival time depends on how many tractors he gets stuck behind. Locals treat both like clockwork; visitors arrive half an hour early and still miss them.

Walking without way-marks

Rioseco makes a convenient trail-head for the Senda de la Montaña de Luna, a lattice of old mule tracks linking nine hamlets. None of the routes is long – eight to twelve kilometres – but gradients are sharp and signposts sporadic. A favourite loop drops south-east through chestnut coppice to the abandoned village of Valdelafuente, climbs past threshing circles and returns along the ridge used by shepherds driving cattle to León’s lowland fairs. Spring brings orchids and the smell of wild marjoram; October turns the woods copper and releases the sweet rot of chestnut husks. Allow four hours, carry water, and download the track before the last mast disappears.

If you prefer a target, hunt for the Iron-Age castro above the cemetery. The summit is only 180 m above the lane but the path is a rutted track used by the gravedigger. Wind-protected walls survive to knee height; fragments of slate pottery still wash out after heavy rain. Pick them up, turn them over, put them back – the regional law is explicit about moving nothing, however small.

Mushroom etiquette

From mid-September the forest floor erupts with níscalos (saffron milk-caps) and boletus edulis. Spanish law allows two kilos per person per day provided you carry them in a basket so spores can fall. The village guardia civil drives up at weekends to check car boots; ignorance of species is not accepted as defence. If you’re unsure, tag behind the white-haired man with the beagle – he’s happy to lecture in exchange for carrying his stick.

Dry years happen: 2022 yielded nothing but parasol mushrooms and a crop of fierce debates about climate change. Accept disappointment, walk anyway, and console yourself with a plate of setas a la plancha at Restaurante Areas-More on the main road. The owner buys from locals at the kitchen door and charges €8 for a heaping dish that tastes of pine smoke and butter.

Food you can’t order in translation

The nearest dining room is indeed Areas-More, three kilometres towards Boñar. Its menú del día costs €14 and runs to three courses, house wine and a slab of country bread. Expect judiones – butter-fat beans the size of a fifty-pence piece – stewed with morcilla, chorizo and a chunk of pork rib thick enough to stave off the north wind. Second course might be arroz con pollo, turmeric-yellow and reassuringly short on bones; pudding is rice pudding dusted with cinnamon, served in the same bowl your soup arrived in. They will not offer vegetarian options; asking produces a plate of eggs and chips while the waitress worries about your health.

Inside the village you eat what your accommodation provides, or self-cater. The tiny Saturday market in Boñar (ten minutes down the hill) sells goat’s-milk cheese wrapped in fern leaves and vacuum-packed beef from tan-coloured rubia gallega cows. Prices are scribbled in marker pen and rise €1 a kilo if the stall-holder detects a foreign accent. Haggle gently, or accept the surcharge as rural tourism tax.

Getting stranded on purpose

There is no bus, no taxi rank, no Uber. The FEVE railway used to stop at nearby Buiza in 2011; the rails are still there, colonised by wild lupins. Hire a car at Valladolid airport (Ryanair from Stansted, May-October) or drive the faster A-231 from Madrid in two hours forty. In winter the LE-142 is cleared after snow, but the final three kilometres into Rioseco can ice over before dawn; carry chains or book a room in Sahagún and walk up after breakfast. Accommodation inside the village is limited to two self-catering cottages booked through the council website – both have wood-burners, neither has Wi-Fi. Phone reception is best on the upstairs landing, left-hand corner, window open.

The honest verdict

Rioseco de Tapia will never appear on a “Top Ten” list; that is the point. It offers altitude without drama, tradition without performance, and silence that only breaks when you stamp the mud off your boots. Come if you want to walk, read, sketch or simply remember what dusk smells like when no streetlights switch on. Do not come for nightlife, boutique shopping or Instagram backdrops – you will leave early, disappointed, and the village will shrug.