Olmedo de Camaces

The granite walls of Olmedo de Camaces start exactly where the asphalt ends. One moment you're navigating the CL-517 from Salamanca, the next your tyres crunch onto a dirt track that climbs through cork oak and aromatic broom. At 700 metres above sea level, this cluster of stone houses operates on mountain time—slower, quieter, governed by the seasonal rhythms of pigs, pasture and the afternoon wind that sweeps up from the Vitigudino basin.

Stone, Slate and the Smell of Wet Granite

Seventy-odd souls live behind the thick masonry walls, built from local granite and quartzite hauled out of nearby quarries. Rooflines sag under terracotta Arab tiles the colour of burnt toast; windows are pint-sized to keep out January draughts that can drop the mercury to -8 °C. Summer compensates—mid-July regularly touches 34 °C—but the altitude knocks the edge off the heat, and night-time temperatures fall low enough for a jumper even in August. Bring one, and don't trust the weather app: Atlantic fronts skid across these uplands, turning a blue morning grey within minutes.

The village is essentially one gently sloping lane. Halfway down sits the parish church, its stone facade more fortress than place of worship. The door is usually locked unless the single Sunday mass is in progress (11 a.m., timetable confirmed by the bar owner but liable to change with the priest's diary). Peer through the iron grille and you can make out a nineteenth-century retable smothered in gilt paint—about as baroque as things get here.

What keeps your boots moving is the ensemble, not individual monuments. Hay is still dried on stone pilasters, bread ovens bulge from rear walls, and every second doorway reveals a cobbled courtyard where a tractor tyre lies next to a lemon tree in an oil drum. The council recently installed discreet brass plaques explaining the old communal wash-house and the grain threshing floor; information is in Spanish only, but the pictures are decipherable enough.

Walking among Holm Oaks and Iberian Pigs

Past the last house a web of farm tracks unrolls across the dehesa, the centuries-old grazing system that mixes grassland with widely spaced holm and cork oak. The going is gentle—this isn't the jagged Sierra de Francia—but you'll climb 150 metres to the ridge south-west of the village, where the province of Salamanca spreads out like a crumpled green blanket. No waymarking posts, no reassuring yellow dashes, so download the free Mapas de España offline sheet or take a compass bearing before the mist rolls in.

Two circular routes are feasible without a car shuttle:

1. Arroyo de Valdeloro loop (6 km, 90 min): follows a seasonal stream through a tunnel of broom and hawthorn, then rises to an abandoned shepherd's hut with stone corrals perfect for lunch. Griffon vultures circle overhead; watch for flashes of azure from Iberian magpies.
2. Puerto de Camaces out-and-back (10 km return, 2½ h): climbs the old drovers' road once used for moving cattle to winter pastures in Extremadura. The track is drivable but traffic-free, and the high point gives 30-km views towards Portugal on a clear day.

Stout shoes suffice; boots only if rain is forecast—clay sections turn slick quickly. Mobile reception is patchy once you drop off the skyline, so tell someone where you're going. The bar can usually rustle up a packed ham-and-cheese bocadillo for €4 if you ask the night before.

What You'll Eat (and When You'll Go Hungry)

There is no restaurant. The single bar, Casa Cándido, opens at 7 a.m. for farmers' coffee and closes when the last customer leaves—often well after midnight at weekends. A glass of local red costs €1.80, a caña of lager €1.50, and the handwritten menu offers:

• Plato de embutidos: chorizo, salchichón, morcilla, roughly €9
• Hornazo, the regional meat-stuffed pie, served room-temperature with a pickled pepper, €6
• Migas, fried breadcrumbs with garlic and pancetta, €7

Once the day's supply is gone, it's gone. If you need gluten-free or vegetarian options, stock up in Vitigudino (12 km) before you drive up the hill. The nearest supermarket big enough for soya milk is in Salamanca city, 75 minutes away.

Should you visit during the October apple-and-quince fair, neighbours set up long tables in the square and dish out cocido stew from copper pots for €5 a bowl. Otherwise, self-catering is safest. The village shop opens three mornings a week: Tuesday, Thursday, Friday, 9–12. Bread arrives at 11; get there early or settle for yesterday's loaf.

Stars, Silence and the Winter Road

Evenings deliver what the brochures promise but rarely achieve: darkness so complete you can read the Milky Way. Light pollution is negligible; meteor showers in August and December attract a handful of Spanish astro-photographers who set up tripods between the stone crosses on the western ridge. Wrap up—night-time humidity makes 10 °C feel like freezing.

Winter brings its own calculus. The final 4 km of access road are untreated gravel; snow in January 2021 blocked the village for two days. A front-wheel-drive car with decent tyres is usually fine, but chains are worth throwing in the boot between December and March. Accommodation shuts down too: the two rental cottages insulate with wood-burning stoves and charge €60–€70 a night, yet owners often retreat to Salamanca from November to March. Email before booking outside high season.

Getting There without a Fleet of Donkeys

No public transport reaches Olmedo de Camaces. The closest rail head is Salamanca (AVE high-speed line from Madrid Chamartín, 1 h 24 min). From there, ALSA runs one daily bus to Vitigudino at 15:30, but you'd still need a 20-minute taxi (€25) to climb into the hills. Hiring a car at Salamanca station is simpler: take the A-62 south for 45 minutes, peel off at exit 274 towards La Fregeneda, then snake along the CL-517 for 25 minutes until the turn-off signpost appears. Petrol stations are scarce after Vitigudino—fill up the tank and your stomach in tandem.

If you're combining villages, schedule Olmedo as a lunch-and-walk break rather than a base. The neighbouring hamlet of Barruecopardo has a fifteenth-century Templar castle you can scale for €3, and the larger market town of Ciudad Rodrigo lies 40 minutes west with a proper cathedral and Saturday farmers' market. Chain them together and you piece together the region's story—border fortifications, transhumance routes, and the quiet high pastures that made it all possible.

Leave before dusk and you'll catch the setting sun igniting the oak trunks the colour of burnt caramel. Stay overnight and you'll learn why locals say the village has two seasons: one for living, one for leaving. Both have their merits; neither will give you a queue, a selfie-stick, or a souvenir shop. Bring cash, a phrasebook, and enough Spanish to ask for another beer. The rest sorts itself out.