Santa Pau

The morning mist clings to the crater of Santa Margarida at 9 a.m. while the church bell in Santa Pau’s stone tower strikes eight. That one-hour delay isn’t a quirk of old machinery; sound travels slower in the cool air trapped by the volcanic basin. Stand on the village walls and you can watch the acoustic shadow move across the valley like a tide, proof that geography still dictates daily life here.

Santa Pau sits 496 metres above sea level on the lip of Spain’s youngest volcanic field. Forty cones and twenty lava flows surround the medieval grid, creating a natural amphitheatre of beech and oak. The altitude means evenings stay cool even in July, so locals keep jackets hanging by front doors year-round. British visitors often forget this and end up buying emergency jumpers from the Saturday market stall that unfurls beside the porticoed main square.

Stone Arcades and Bean Fields

The Firal dels Bous, the irregular porticoed square at the village heart, was once a cattle market. Gothic arches of black volcanic stone still support the upper storeys; ground-floor cafés slide their shutters up at seven for farm workers who need coffee before heading to the bean plots. Santa Pau’s mongetes carry a protected designation of origin, the only Spanish bean with the status. They look like small haricots, cook without splitting and taste faintly of chestnut. Order them stewed with botifarra sausage at Cal Sastre and you’ll understand why Catalans drive two hours for lunch.

The square’s arcades aren’t museum pieces. Children kick footballs against the stone, neighbours lean from balconies to argue about tomato prices, and the baker delivers bread by heaving his van across the cobbles at walking pace. Tourists expecting hushed reverence sometimes look startled; residents shrug and step round the tripod.

Above the roofs, the thirteenth-century castle of the Barons of Santa Pau keeps watch. It’s privately owned and has been closed for restoration since 2019, scaffolding wrapped round the cylindrical towers like a half-finished knitting project. You can walk the exterior walls in ten minutes; donation boxes shaped like miniature volcanoes collect euros for roof tiles. The information panel shows the original floor plan: stables, dungeons, a chapel with arrow-slit windows. Peer through the gate and you’ll see a bright plastic slide installed by the present family for their grandchildren – medieval power meets modern play equipment.

Walking on Lava

Santa Pau works as a base for hikers who want volcanic drama without alpine equipment. The easiest route leaves from the upper car park, crosses two lava flows and drops into the crater of Santa Margarida. Inside the perfectly round bowl sits a tiny Romanesque hermitage where shepherds once sheltered. The walk is 5 km return, mostly level until the final 80-step descent, and takes ninety minutes at British strolling speed. Signposts are in Catalan, Spanish and English; way-marking is so thorough that you’ll spend more time reading arrows than map-reading.

Serious walkers can link three craters in a 14 km loop that finishes at the Fageda d’en Jordà, a beech forest growing on a lava tongue. The trees reach uniform height because their roots hit solid rock at the same level; the effect is a green billiard table trimmed with moss. October colour rivals anything in the Cotswolds, but book accommodation early – Catalans flood in at weekends to photograph the canopy.

Winter brings a different challenge. The basin traps cold air, so snow lingers when the coast is sunny. Roads are gritted, but the last 4 km from Olot can be sheet ice. If you’re renting, ask for chains; the bus service shrinks to three runs a day and taxis refuse the climb after dusk. On the plus hand, hotel rates halve and you get the crater to yourself, footsteps muffled by powder.

Cheese, Yoghurt and a 40-Minute Lunch Window

Food rhythms still follow the farming clock. Kitchens open at 13:00, close at 15:30, and that’s that. Turn up at 15:45 and even the bar nuts disappear. Sunday is worst: most cooks head home to their mothers, so either reserve or eat early. Vegetarians do better than expected – volcanic soil grows superb aubergines and peppers, often grilled on slabs of the same stone that built the church.

Five kilometres north, the cooperative dairy of La Fageda employs adults with learning difficulties and produces yoghurt so thick you can stand a spoon in it. Free tours run at 11:00 and 15:00 on weekdays; you taste vanilla, lemon and burnt-caramel flavours while looking out at contented Friesians. Their tubs fill Barcelona fridges, yet the export price in Waitrose is triple the farm gate.

If you need supplies, the Spar on Carrer Major stocks local truffle cannelloni ready to bake. Pair with a bottle of Garnatxa from the neighbouring cellar and you have dinner for two under a tenner. Cash is king: contactless often fails inside the walls because granite blocks 4G signals.

Getting There, Staying Over

No railway reaches Santa Pau. From the UK, fly to Barcelona, take the train to Girona (38 min), then Teisa bus 271 to Olot (1 h 10 min). Change to the yellow Línia 33 minibus which winds up through oak forest, depositing you outside the stone gateway 25 minutes later. Total journey from Gatwick: roughly five hours gate-to-square, faster than reaching many Lake District villages by rail plus taxi.

One daily bus continues to the coast, so day-trippers often pair Santa Pau with Besalú’s bridge. It’s feasible but rushed; the road looks straight on the map yet averages 35 km/h. Better to stay overnight. Hotel Cal Sastre has six rooms carved from a fifteenth-century house: beams, lime-washed walls, Wi-Fi that actually works. Doubles from €90 including breakfast tray of crusty bread, fresh cheese and honey from the hives you walked past yesterday. Cheaper pensións exist, but hot water can be volcanic in the wrong sense.

Leave the car on the ring road if you’ve hired; streets inside are one-way and narrower than a Tesco trolley. Parking discs are free for the first four hours, then €1 per day – another reminder that time moves differently at altitude.

Last Light

At dusk the square empties suddenly, as if someone blew a whistle. Shop shutters clatter down, swifts replace children overhead, and the volcanic stone glows amber. From the wall you can see headlights winding up from Olot like a lava stream in reverse. The air smells of wood smoke and bean stubble; temperatures drop ten degrees in half an hour. Wrap up, order a final cortado, and remember that tomorrow the crater will be waiting, unchanged since the last eruption 11,000 years ago. Just don’t expect the castle to be open.