Campdevànol

The 7 a.m. train from Barcelona pulls in at Campdevànol with a two-carriage shrug. Half the passengers are local schoolchildren; the rest carry walking poles and a look that says they’ve read about the Ruta dels 7 Gorgs online. By 7.20 the station forecourt is empty again, the kids have vanished up the hill, and the village returns to the business of simply existing—something it has been doing, quietly, since long before Instagram noticed the waterfalls.

Campdevànol sits at 738 m in the Ripollès comarca, where the Pyrenees stop posturing and settle into wooded ridges and hay meadows. It is not a chocolate-box hamlet: the main street has a pharmacy, two bakeries, a caixa with an ATM that regularly runs out of €20 notes, and a supermarket that stocks everything from fresh boletus to bleach. The architecture is stone-and-slate functional rather than fairy-tale, yet the overall effect is reassuring—proof that a place can serve visitors without turning itself into a diorama.

Forest trails, river pools and one controversial ticket booth

The headliner is, undeniably, the Gorges del Rigard. A six-kilometre loop follows the river as it squeezes through seven polished basins cold enough to make a Yorkshire swimmer yelp. The water is clear, the granite smooth, and the third pool—Gorg de la Granota—has a rope swing that appears in half the photos on TripAdvisor. What the images rarely show is the queue at the entrance kiosk: €22 per car at weekends, cash only, with a marshall who waves you into graded rows like an Oxford park-and-ride. Arrive before nine or the line backs up onto the C-17 and the best swimming holes already echo with cannon-bomb shouts.

Once past the pay barrier the path narrows, the temperature drops five degrees, and the only soundtrack is water and the odd grunt of someone regretting flip-flops. Proper footwear—river shoes or old trainers—is essential; the granite slabs are slipperier than a January pavement in Leeds. After rain the final gorge can be waist-deep, so zip-lock your phone and accept that your socks will never be the same.

If turnstiles dent the wilderness fantasy, quieter alternatives exist. A 20-minute drive towards Gombrèn leads to the ruined monastery of Sant Aniol, reachable by a 4 km track through holm-oak forest. There is no ticket office, no burger van, just stone arches and a spring that locals claim cures hangovers. Carry water; the only facilities are a stone trough and the occasional cow.

A high street that still belongs to residents

Back in the village, the old quarter clusters around the twelfth-century church of Santa Maria. Its bell tower lost its Romanesque purity during a nineteenth-century facelift, but the interior still smells of candle wax and damp stone on weekday mornings. A couple of cafés set out tables under plane trees; pensioners play cards and ignore the menu translated into school-trip French. Lunchtime menus run €14–16 and follow the mountain formula: hearty soup, grilled chicken or rabbit, crème caramel. Can Xel does the best version; their chips are hand-cut and the waitresses will warn you if you order too much.

Evenings are low-key. Youngsters drift to the skate ramp by the river, grandparents occupy the benches, and British families emerge from rented timber cabins clutching bottles of Estrella Damm bought in the Spar. The supermarket closes at 9 p.m. sharp—don’t expect 24-hour service.

Railways, religion and the cheese that travels home

History here is transport and faith. Campdevànol’s station once marked the end of the rack-and-pinion line up to the shrine of Núria; pilgrims still change trains here on summer weekends, filling the platform with rucksacks and folding walking sticks. The original 1920s ticket hall survives as a waiting room; faded timetables advertise departures to France that stopped in 1936.

Ripoll, seven kilometres down-valley, has the blockbuster monastery where Catalonia was allegedly born, but Campdevànol keeps a humbler medieval footprint. Follow Carrer Major past the stone cross and you’ll reach the Pont Vell, a single-arch bridge over the Rigard rebuilt after the civil war. Photographers like the upstream angle at sunset when the water glows amber; the parapet is wide enough for a tripod but mind the traffic of tractors returning from the fields.

Gastronomy is mountain-plain: sausages, beans, mushrooms when in season. Formatgeria Palou, on the industrial estate behind the petrol station, sells young goat’s cheese so mild it wins over even the “I don’t do goat” crowd. Vacuum-packed 250 g wedges survive a Ryanair cabin bag and make a softer souvenir than a bottle of ratafía.

When to come, how to get here, and why you might leave early

Spring and early autumn deliver the best compromise: warm days, cool nights, gorges refilled by snowmelt or early storms. July and August push 30 °C in the valley—perfect for swimming but hard work on the steeper tracks. Winter brings quiet, log-burners and occasional powder on the higher ridges, yet the C-17 is usually cleared within hours; chains are rarely required in the village itself.

Public transport works if you are patient: regional trains leave Barcelona’s Plaça de Catalunya every hour; change at Ripoll if you’re heading for the Vall de Núria rack railway. By car from Girona airport it’s 1 h 45 min up the C-17—easier than the coast road to Roses and a lot less crowded once you pass Vic. Having wheels helps for supermarkets and out-of-town restaurants; taxis are thin on the ground after 10 p.m.

Accommodation splits between apartments in the old centre and scattered wooden cabins in the pine belt above town. Prices hover around €90 a night for a two-bedroom lodge with kitchen—handy when the sole gorge-side burger van runs out of bread at 2 p.m. Book early for late August; the Festa Major fills every bed as emigrants return for correfocs (fire-run devils) and all-night dancing in the plaça.

The bottom line

Campdevànol will not dazzle you with Michelin stars or white-washed boutique hotels. What it offers is a working Catalan mountain village that happens to have a world-class river walk on its doorstep, plus bakeries that still sell bread at seven in the morning and a train platform where the guard wishes you “bona caminada” as you set off. If that sounds like enough, come mid-week, bring cash, and pack shoes you don’t mind soaking. If you need craft-beer bars and curated street art, keep driving towards the coast—both of you will be happier.