Matet

The church bell strikes eleven and the sound rolls down Matet's single main street, bounces off stone walls, and disappears into the pine forest below. No car engines, no chatter, just the bell and a distant dog. That's when you realise this isn't one of those half-empty villages that still pretends to be busy. Matet, population eighty-four, has given up pretending.

At 586 metres above the Alto Palancia, the village sits high enough to catch the breeze but low enough to avoid snowdrifts. The road up – CV-205 if you're following sat-nav – narrows so dramatically in the final kilometres that meeting a delivery van feels like a diplomatic incident. Pull into the tiny plaza, kill the engine, and the silence actually has weight.

Stone, Sun and Abandoned Almond Terraces

Matet's centre fits inside a football pitch. Cobbled lanes no wider than a supermarket trolley twist between houses the colour of burnt cream. Some are immaculate, geraniums trailing from wrought-iron balconies; others have trees growing through the roof, their former owners long dead and the inheritance split between distant cousins who can't agree on a sale price. The effect is strangely honest: a village ageing in real time, not airbrushed for tourists.

Walk ten minutes in any direction and you're among abandoned almond terraces. Stone walls built during the Moorish period still hold back soil that nobody farms anymore. In late February the surviving trees blossom pink against grey limestone – pretty until you remember each blossom represents labour no one can afford. Bring decent shoes: the paths are technically marked but goat tracks look official after rain.

The only obvious viewpoint is El Pilón, a bald rocky knoll fifteen minutes above the houses. From here the Sierra de Espadán spreads west like crumpled green paper. On very clear days you can pick out the Mediterranean, a silver blade on the horizon forty-five kilometres away. Don't expect a souvenir kiosk; the summit furniture is a concrete trig point and one bench with a view straight down a 200-metre drop.

What to Do When There's Nothing to Do

Hiking options are modest but satisfying. A circular track heads south to the abandoned hamlet of Mas de Cabrera – roofless stone, a still-flowing spring, silence – then loops back via pine forest. Total distance 7 km, negligible ascent, takes two hours including the inevitable stop to photograph mushrooms. If that sounds too gentle, the GR-36 long-distance path skirts the village; follow it north and you can walk all the way to the Ebro, though most people bail at Segorbe for a beer.

Bird life is surprisingly lively: booted eagles overhead, hoopoes laughing from telephone wires, and enough serins to make you question whether Britain's songbird population has simply moved here. Dawn and dusk bring red deer to the fields directly below the village; listen for the bark of a roe buck that echoes like a cracked trumpet.

Photographers run out of battery before they run out of material. Doorways are the obvious obsession – some painted ox-blood red, others stripped by sun to the colour of digestive biscuits – but the real treat is the quality of light. At golden hour the stone glows the same shade as Burnished Ale; by moonlight the whole village looks carved from chalk.

One Bar, No Cashpoint, Plenty of Longaniza

Practicalities first: fill the hire car in Segorbe, twenty minutes back down the valley. Matet has zero petrol, zero cash machines, and one tiny general store that opens when the owner feels like it. Casa Rosa, the lone bar, serves toasted sandwiches, ice-cold Estrella, and surprisingly good coffee for €1.20. Their Saturday special is longaniza sausage from a farm in neighbouring Soneja – order it grilled with bread and you'll understand why Spaniards don't rush breakfast.

For a proper meal you drive to Soneja (8 km) where Bar Avenida does grilled chicken that even British teenagers concede is "basically Nando's but better". If you're self-catering, stock up in Mercadona at Segorbe before the final climb; Matet's shop carries tinned tuna, tinned tomatoes, and not much else.

The August fiesta turns the village into something resembling a crowd. Returnees from Valencia and Barcelona swell numbers to maybe three hundred. A brass band plays pasodobles in the plaza, someone sets up a paella pan the diameter of a satellite dish, and at midnight they raffle a ham. It's the only time of year you'll queue for a beer – the rest of the time Casa Rosa has plenty of empty stools.

Seasons of Silence

Spring arrives late at this altitude; almond blossom in February, wild orchids through April. Temperatures hover around 20 °C – perfect walking weather – and the scent of thyme follows you up every trail. Summer is a different contract: July and August regularly hit 35 °C by mid-afternoon. Trails become ovens; start early or don't start at all. The municipal pool opens July-only, fills with local kids by eleven, and closes when the lifeguard fancies a siesta. Book a casa rural with its own pool if swimming matters.

Autumn might be the sweet spot. Mushrooms pop up after the first September rains, mornings are crisp enough for a fleece, and the light turns buttery. Winter can be sharp – frost on the windscreen, woodsmoke drifting from chimneys – but days are often bright and the air so clear you can count individual cypress trees twenty kilometres away. Just don't come expecting snow-dusted chocolate-box charm; when the wind blows from the Meseta it cuts straight through stone walls.

The Honest Verdict

Matet is not a destination for ticking off sights. You will not find a Moorish castle, a Michelin plate, or a gift shop selling fridge magnets. What you get instead is an unfiltered slice of inland Valencia before tourism arrived. That means silence broken only by church bells, villagers who nod hello because they know you're the only stranger today, and the faintly surreal realisation that real life continues in places that TripAdvisor forgot.

Come if you want to walk without meeting anyone, if you like your villages slightly frayed rather than freshly painted, and if you're content to watch the day end from El Pilón with a lukewarm can of beer you remembered to bring up. Leave after twenty-four hours and you'll feel restored; stay a week and you might start recognising the dog that barks at 3 a.m., learn which house leaves out free lemons, and seriously consider buying one of those crumbling terraces yourself. That's when you know Matet has done its job – not by impressing you, but by reminding you how little you actually need.