Cobreros

At 1,100 metres above sea level, the morning coffee in Cobreros arrives with a view straight into Portugal. The granite houses face south-west; sit on the Hospedería terrace and you can watch the sun lift over Sierra de la Culebra while your phone flickers between Spanish and Portuguese networks. It is 09:30, the temperature is still in single figures, and the only shop within a 15-minute drive has not yet opened. The silence is so complete that you hear the village water fountain before you see it.

Cobreros sits on the northern lip of the Sanabria district, Zamora province, an hour beyond Puebla de Sanabria on the A-52 and then another 45 minutes of switchbacks. Madrid is three hours away, Santiago de Compostela two and a half, Porto two. The last petrol pumps are at Puebla; after that the road climbs through heather and broom until the stone houses appear, roofs pinned down with heavy slate to resist the winter gales. In January the village can be cut off for a day or two by snow; in July the night-time thermometer still drops to 12 °C, so pack a fleece even if the hire-car thermometer hit 32 °C on the motorway.

Stone, Slate and Silence

The settlement is strung along a ridge – barely four streets deep – and everything useful faces the same direction: south, towards the sun and away from the Atlantic weather that sweeps across the plateau. Houses are two-storey, built from local granite, with wooden balconies called corredores where maize once dried. Doors are painted ox-blood red or left bare; geraniums provide the only deliberate colour. You will not find souvenir shops, ice-cream parlours or guided tours. The parish church of San Vicente closes at dusk; the key hangs on a nail inside the bar if you want to look around. Inside, the air smells of candle wax and damp stone; the retable is 18th-century but nobody will hurry you past it.

Walking is the default activity, mainly because there is nothing else to do. A lattice of farm tracks leaves the upper village, signed simply camino. One path drops 250 m to the Rio Trefacio, where otter prints appear in the mud after rain; another climbs gently through oak and sweet chestnut to an abandoned hamlet called A Canda, three roofless houses and a working bread oven. Allow two hours for the circuit, longer if you stop to watch the short-toed eagles that circle overhead. After heavy rain the clay sections turn to porridge; proper boots are sensible all year.

Food Meant for Log Fires

Meals follow the mountain calendar. From October to April the speciality is cocido sanabres, a gentle chickpea and beef stew flavoured with pimentón that arrives at table in a glazed earthenware bowl big enough for two. Spring brings calçots-style barbecues in nearby fields; summer is for ternera asturiana steaks grilled over oak, the local answer to a British rib-eye but half the price. The village bar, simply Bar Cobreros, opens at seven for coffee and churros on fiesta days, closes at eleven whatever the season. They stock Sanabria craft beer – a 5 % blonde ale labelled in English on the back – and will make you a tostada with local honey instead of the usual tomato and garlic if you ask before they reach for the olive oil.

If you arrive on a Friday you can order bread for the weekend; on Monday the baker takes the day off. The nearest supermarket is in Trefacio, 12 km down the mountain, so most visitors book half-board at the Hospedería. Breakfast is strong coffee, fresh milk and sobaos, a Cantabrian sponge that travels well in a rucksack. Dinner is three courses plus wine and costs €22; request vegetarian in advance or you will get the stew.

Wolves at Dusk (Perhaps)

Cobreros lies just outside the Sierra de la Culebra hunting reserve, one of the last places in western Europe where Iberian wolves breed. Seeing one is unlikely unless you are prepared to sit motionless in a hide before dawn, but their presence shapes the countryside: farmers keep mastiffs, gates are shut at night, and the council reimburses €250 for every confirmed sheep kill. Easier sightings include red deer at first light, wild boar rooting under the chestnuts, and hen harriers quartering the fields. Bring binoculars and a zoom lens; the animals are used to tractors, not people on foot.

Autumn mushroom foraging is taken seriously. A permit (free) is required from the Zamora forestry office and picking is banned within 100 m of the road; the favoured species are boletus edulis and níscalo. Ask in the bar and someone will draw you a map, but accept that locals left at six a.m. and the best spots are already emptied. If you return with nothing but muddy boots, the barman will still grill whatever someone else has brought in.

When the Village Returns to Itself

Fiestas happen in August, when emigrant families come back from Madrid, Barcelona or Switzerland. The programme changes each year but always includes a Saturday night verbena that lasts until the generator runs out of diesel, and a Sunday mass followed by paella cooked in a pan the size of a satellite dish. Visitors are welcome to join the queue; bring your own plate and pay €5 towards the wine. Semana Santa is quieter: a single procession on Good Friday, hooded cofradía members walking to a drum beat, candles shielded from the wind. Winter traditions persist in private houses – the annual pig slaughter becomes a family party where nothing is wasted and everyone leaves with a string of chorizo – but outsiders are invited only if they are staying long enough to help scrub the blood off the patio.

How to Do It

Getting there: Ryanair and easyJet fly Stansted–Santiago daily; from Santiago take the AP-9 to Ourense, then the A-52 east to Puebla de Sanabria. The final 35 km is on the N-525 and ZA-104, both paved but narrow. A car is essential; there is no bus, taxis must be booked a day ahead from Puebla and cost €60 each way.

Where to stay: Hospedería Casa de los Migueletes has eleven rooms, underfloor heating and a terrace that faces west for sunset. Doubles from €70 including breakfast; closed January. Cheaper apartments scatter through the village – ask at the bar and someone will phone the owner.

Money: Bring cash. The nearest ATM is in Cobeta, 20 minutes away, and the bar prefers notes to cards. Contactless works at the hotel but fails when the wind knocks out the repeater.

Weather: Snow possible November–March; roads are cleared quickly but winter tyres are advised. July afternoons reach 28 °C but nights drop to 12 °C; spring and autumn are the sweet spots, 18 °C by day, cool enough for walking.

Leave the coast behind, forget the clock, and you will discover that Cobreros offers exactly what it promises: mountain air, granite houses that have withstood two centuries of weather, and a bar where the television stays off unless the wolves are on the news. Stay two nights, walk one track, eat one stew, and you will understand why half the village left – and why they still come home every summer.