Òrrius

The first thing you notice is the elephant. Half-hidden among holm oaks, trunk raised mid-trumpet, it’s carved from a boulder the size of a Fiat 500. No plaque explains it, no gift shop sells miniatures. The sculpture simply sits there, five minutes’ walk from Òrrius’s single traffic junction, as if the rock had decided to reincarnate on a whim.

That elephant is the gatekeeper to the Bosc Encantat, the Enchanted Forest, a 3-kilometre loop of sandstone outcrops that local mason Josep Pascual has been turning into beasts, faces and totems since 1997. The route starts opposite the village cemetery, climbs gently through pines and emerges, 90 minutes later, back on the tarmac. Between start and finish you’ll meet a gap-toothed ogre, a row of Easter-Island heads and a snake whose coils form a bench. Children tally the sculptures like safari sightings; adults find themselves discussing what, exactly, motivates a man to spend decades chiselling monsters in somebody else’s woods.

A village that forgot the sea is only 12 km away

Òrrius perches at 259 m on the last ripple of the Serra del Corredor, close enough to glimpse the Mediterranean on a clear day but far enough to avoid its package-holiday gravity. The population sits stubbornly below 600; many houses are weekend retreats for Barcelonans who want chickens in the yard and silence after 11 pm. Stone masías dot the surrounding slopes, their roofs still tiled with rust-red teules and their doorways low enough to bang a 19th-century farmer’s head. Some have been renovated into glass-walled second homes; others slump gently into the earth, stables converted into wood-stores.

The village centre is a triangle of narrow lanes no wider than a Bedford van. At its apex stands the 12th-century church of Sant Cebrià, a Romanesque box enlarged whenever the local head-count outgrew the pews. The bell still rings the toc de mort for every funeral – a slow, unamplified toll that drifts across the valley and reminds weekenders that this remains a working parish, not a theme set.

Weekday life revolves around the Carnisseria d’Òrrius (open 08:00–13:00, Tuesday to Saturday) and the single bar, Cal Tatano, where farmers prop up the counter at 09:00 and the owner keeps a running tab written in eyebrow pencil on a paper napkin. If you need petrol, cash or a newspaper after 14:00 you’ll have to drive 8 km to Cardedeu; Òrius’s last filling station closed in 2004 and the cash machine was ripped out during the financial crisis.

Walking among vineyards that refuse to die

The Bosc Encantat may grab the Instagram traffic, but the longer pleasure is the lattice of footpaths that fan out from the village. One favourite heads south along the Camí Vell de Cardedeu, an old mule track paved with beer-bottle-sized stones. After 40 minutes the holm oaks give way to terraced vinya where the last hobbyist growers coax garnatxa and tempranillo from thin, granitic soil. Phylloxera wiped out the commercial trade in the 1890s, yet every April you’ll find locals pruning by hand, tying canes to chestnut stakes cut from the same forest that supplies calçots barbecues.

Carry on another 20 minutes and you reach the Font de la Ferrera, a spring that tastes faintly of iron and once supplied the village laundry. Stone sinks still stand, green with moss, their scrubbing boards carved into the rock. Fill a bottle; the water is potable and colder than anything you’ll buy in a Barcelona supermercat.

If energy permits, continue to the ridge at Turó de les Mentides (467 m). From here the view stretches from Montseny’s snow-capped pyramid to the condo towers of Mataró, a reminder that the Costa Brava starts just 15 minutes’ drive away. The descent re-enters forest proper – pinsaple and rosemary understorey – before dropping you back at the cemetery gate, total time just under three hours and cumulative ascent a modest 220 m. Stout trainers suffice; leave the Kendal Mint Cake at home.

When to come, how to arrive, and why you might leave hungry

Public transport is the village’s Achilles heel. There is no train station; the nearest Rodalies stop is Cardedeu, 8 km downhill. A taxi from there costs €18 if you can persuade one to make the trip – pre-booking is essential and weekend drivers prefer airport runs. The realistic option is hire car: take the C-32 from Barcelona to Mataró, switch to the C-60 and follow signs for Òrrius. Journey time is 35 minutes on a quiet morning, twice that on a summer Friday when every barceloní heads coast-ward.

Parking is free but finite. The forest track entrance holds twelve cars; arrive after 11:00 on a Sunday and you’ll be reversing half a kilometre to the church square. Mid-week you may share the path with one dog-walker and the sculptor himself, still chipping away at a block he started in 2019.

Bring food. Cal Tatano serves a dependable three-course menú del día for €18 (wine included) but opens only Friday to Sunday out of season. Mid-week you’ll find the kitchen closed and the owner’s mother watching Telediario at full volume. The bakery closed in 2018; the nearest supermarket is a Condis in Argentona, 6 km away. Locals shop before 13:00, then siesta until 17:00 when the village falls so quiet you can hear the church clock tick from 200 m.

Spring and autumn deliver the kindest light: temperatures in the high teens, wild marjoram scenting the air, and enough cloud to photograph the sculptures without harsh shadow. August is furnace-hot; the forest offers patchy shade and the elephant’s back becomes too hot to touch. Winter brings a crisp, resinous clarity – and the risk that a tramontana wind will make the 259 m feel like 1,000. Check the forecast; the forest path is closed during high-fire-risk days, increasingly common after April.

Stone, silence, and the slow road back to Barcelona

By 16:00 the day-trippers have retreated to the beach bars of El Masnou, leaving the village to its rhythms. The butcher hoses down the pavement; a woman in house slippers waters geraniums on a balcony; somewhere a caged canary practises scales. You could squeeze in another short loop – perhaps the 45-minute stroll to the hermitage of Sant Miquel – but the smarter move is to sit on the church steps, unwrap the fuet bought earlier, and watch the light turn the stone walls the colour of pale sherry.

Òrrius will never make anybody’s bucket list. It has no Michelin stars, no direct rail link, no souvenir tea-towels. What it offers instead is the rare sensation that, less than 40 minutes from Barcelona, you can still hear a boot scrape on gravel and mistake it for your own echo. When the canary falls silent and the bell strikes the half-hour, you remember why you left the coast in the first place – and why, before long, the motorway will carry you back.