Darnius

The first thing you notice is the hush. Not the oppressive silence of empty places, but the particular quiet that settles when cork-oak leaves stop rustling and the only sound is a hawk somewhere overhead. Darnius sits 200 metres above the surrounding plain, high enough for the Mediterranean to glint distantly on clear days, low enough that fig trees still ripen in October. It's the sort of place where directions are given by the old cork factory chimney—still blackened from the 1950s—and where the bakery opens only when the baker hears three knocks.

The Reservoir That Thinks It's a Lake

Locals call it el pantà, never el embalse. The Darnius-Boadella reservoir was flooded in 1969 to irrigate the Empordà's apple orchards, but from the pine-shaded southern track it looks like a proper mountain lake, 8 km long and edged with schist coves perfect for launching a kayak. British visitors who panic about currents—"my children saw Jaws too young" one Yorkshire mother admitted—treat it as a training-wheel sea. No motorboats are allowed, so the loudest noise is usually a paddle clipping the gunwale.

The Club Nàutic, a low concrete building that smells of wet neoprene and strong coffee, hires sit-on-tops for €12 an hour. They'll also lend you a watertight drum for phones, though 4G fades once you round the first headland. Swim out 100 metres and the water turns from khaki to a cold, bottle-green; carp shadow your feet, and on hot July afternoons the surface steams like a bath. Midges appear at dusk—bring repellent or copy the Catalan grandfathers who splash on cheap cologne and seem perfectly content.

Stone, Cork and the Smell of Rain on Granite

Darnius won't win prizes for medieval spectacle. The 18th-century church of Sant Feliu squats at the top of the only street wide enough for two cars to pass, its bell tower patched with mismatched stone after an 1894 lightning strike. What the village does have is continuity: the same families have shaped roof tiles here since 1850, and the tiny plaça still contains a 12th-century Romanesque portal now recycled as the entrance to somebody's garage.

Walk downhill past the old olive press (stone wheel still in situ, currently full of bicycles) and you reach the former cork factory, closed since 1992 when wine makers switched to screw tops. The brick chimney is a roost for jackdaws; at ground level the loading bay has become an impromptu bar where workers drink canya beer at 11 a.m. and discuss rainfall as if it were football. Cork oak bark is harvested again these days, but the strips are trucked to Girona rather than peeled on site, so the air no longer carries the sweet, almond-like scent of boiling cork. Ask nicely and the foreman will show you a plank stamped "Darnius 1978" destined for a Penhaligon's after-shave stopper.

Paths That Start Behind the Recycling Bins

Hiking maps sold in the baker's depict six way-marked loops. The easiest, a 45-minute circuit to the mirador, begins between the glass-bank and a chicken coop whose cockerel objects to day-trippers. Yellow dashes lead through holm-oak and aleppo pine to a slate outcrop overlooking the reservoir; on clear winter mornings you can pick out the white tower of the coastal power station 35 km away. Spring brings orchids and the distant thud of wild boar; in September the hillside smells of rosemary and hot resin.

Ambitious walkers can continue south along the GR-11 long-distance footpath, reaching the French border in a day. Take water—there are no cafés after the village edge, only the occasional stone hut whose rain barrel may or may not contain drowned wasps. Mobile reception is patchy; if you twist an ankle, the accepted rescue method is to fire three shots from a starting pistol. Nobody has tested this theory recently.

What to Eat When the Baker Has Gone Fishing

Darnius has two restaurants, both closed on Wednesdays out of season. Cal Xic is the smarter option: white tablecloths, €18 three-course menú del día, and a waitress who learnt English working in Brighton. Order the reservoir trout with almonds—mild, unthreatening, bones that lift away cleanly. The house red comes from Figueres and tastes of sun-baked cherries; ask for the porró if you fancy pouring wine from a spouted glass jug into your mouth without touching lips (expect spillage, applause, or both).

For something less formal, the Club Nàutic serves what locals call "workers' breakfast": botifarra pork sausage, chips and half a baguette for €6. Vegetarians aren't forgotten—coca de recapte (flatbread topped with roast aubergine and red pepper) appears every afternoon about two, disappears by half past. Pudding is usually bunyols, golf-ball doughnuts rolled in sugar; they cool quickly, so eat first, photograph later.

Getting There, Staying Over, Knowing When to Leave

Girona airport is 50 minutes away on the new A-26; car hire desks stay open for delayed Ryanair flights, but ring ahead if you're landing after 10 p.m. Without wheels you'll struggle—buses from Figueres reach Darnius twice daily, except Sundays when the service hibernates. The road up is paved but narrow; meeting a tractor round a bend will test both wing mirrors and Catalan hand-signal vocabulary.

Accommodation is thin on the ground. Masia Mimosa, run by a British couple who swapped Surrey for cork forest, offers four guest rooms and a swimming pool that overlooks the reservoir. Expect proper tea, Marmite at breakfast, and tips on which walking trails are currently occupied by frisky cattle. Self-caterers can rent the old schoolhouse in the nucli antic—stone floors, wood-burning stove, Wi-Fi fast enough for iPlayer if the wind isn't blowing from France.

Come in late May when the hills are still green, the temperature hovers around 22 °C, and hotel rates haven't yet inflated with the August invasion. October is equally kind: warm days, cool nights, figs and sweet chestnuts for sale in front of houses on the honour system (€2 a kilo, slot coins through the letterbox). Mid-winter brings a different kind of visitor—birdwatchers hoping for wallcreepers on the dam face—plus the risk of overnight frost that turns the narrow road into a toboggan run.

Leave before you start recognising every dog by name. Darnius works because it remains slightly inconvenient; stay too long and the silence begins to feel theatrical, the shepherd's mobile phone ringing from the next valley like a stagehand's cue. Drive back down the cork-oak corridor, reservoir flashing between trunks, and the coast arrives suddenly—supermarkets, roundabouts, the thud of club music from beach bars. You'll appreciate the contrast, and probably start planning the return journey before you reach the motorway toll.