Navajas

The 11:03 from Valencia Nord drops you beside an almond orchard, 383 metres above sea level and a world away from the city's orange-tree promenades. Navajas station is a single concrete platform; the guard whistles the train away before the valley falls quiet again. From here it's a ten-minute riverside walk into the village centre—just long enough to notice how much cooler the air feels than on the coast, and how every house seems to have a water spout trickling into a stone trough.

That water shapes everything. The village sits cupped in a fold of the Sierra de Javalambre, where the Palancia river squeezes through limestone gorges and cold springs pop out at ground level. Follow the sound of falling water upstream and you reach the Salto de la Novia, a 60-metre ribbon that lands in a green pool ten minutes from the main square. The path is paved but narrow; after rain it films with algae and claims the occasional trainer. British visitors who arrive in sandals usually regret it.

A Village that Works Year-Round

Navajas isn't a museum. The 840-odd residents include mechanics, olive farmers and a growing band of tele-workers who've traded Valencia flats for stone houses with fibre-optic. Walk the lanes at eight in the morning and you'll meet elderly women carrying shopping nets to the bakery, delivery vans squeezing past medieval arches, and secondary-school pupils heading to the bus stop that serves the institute in Segorbe. Sunday lunchtime is different: Spanish number plates fill every kerb space as extended families claim the terraces of Bar Altomira and Café Valenciano. If you want a table, arrive before 13:30 or after 16:30—kitchens close religiously in between.

The church of San Bartolomé anchors the upper town. It's a modest Gothic-Renaissance hybrid, restored after civil-war damage; the stone still shows bullet pocks if you look closely. Next door, the Molino de la Esperanza houses a single restored waterwheel that once ground wheat for the valley. You can't go inside, but the mill race still channels water under the road and emerges as a drinking fountain. Locals top up five-litre jugs here; tourists photograph the wheel and move on.

Walking the Waterways

Maps in the tourist office (open weekday mornings, Saturday until 13:00) mark three circular footpaths. The shortest, the Camino del Agua, shadows irrigation ditches for 4 km through vegetable plots and reed beds. In April the air smells of fennel and lemon blossom; by late June the vegetation is tinder-dry and cicadas drown the river. None of the routes climbs above 600 m, so winter hiking is feasible—just carry a waterproof if a cold drop of levante wind is forecast.

Linking Navajas with neighbouring Jerica adds another 8 km along the river gorge. The path ducks through tunnels of cane, crosses a 19th-century aqueduct and finishes in Jerica's Moorish quarter. From Jerica's castle tower you can see the Mediterranean glinting 40 km away, and the return train to Valencia stops at both villages—handy if legs give out.

What to Eat, What to Drink

Forget tasting menus. Navajas does interior-Valencian cooking: thick lentil stews with chard, rabbit baked with bay leaves, and plates of grilled artichokes when in season. Altomira's entrecôte arrives splayed across the plate, daubed with Rioja sauce and accompanied by proper chips—no aioli swirl in sight. A three-course menú del día at Café Valenciano costs around €14 and includes half a bottle of Rioja; wine quality is drinkable rather than memorable, though the local Crianza "Mirador de Navajas" offers decent cherry fruit for €12 a bottle in the bars.

Vegetarians survive on tortilla, salads and the excellent house-made croquetas. Gluten-free bread is available if you ask the day before. Pudding is usually supermarket ice-cream or crema catalana; nobody pretends otherwise.

Seasons and Sensibilities

April–May brings pink Judas trees along the river and daytime temperatures of 18–22 °C—perfect walking weather. September light turns the limestone cliffs honey-coloured, and the grape harvest fills roadside trailers. Mid-summer is hot (34 °C is normal) but mornings stay fresh; climb the waterfall path before 10:00 and you'll share it only with the village dogs. January can see frost on the car windscreens, yet almond blossom opens by late February and the first asparagus appears in the ditches.

Bank holidays transform the place. During San Bartolomé fiestas (week around 24 August) brass bands march at 02:00 and firecrackers ricochet between the houses. Book accommodation months ahead or stay in Segorbe and taxi in. Conversely, arrive on a Tuesday in February and you'll wonder if the village has closed for inventory—both restaurants shut and the bakery sells out by noon.

Getting There, Getting Fed, Getting Home

Valencia airport has daily flights from London, Manchester and Bristol. Take Metro 3 or 5 to Valencia Nord (25 min, €2.40), then the C-5 regional train. The 55-minute journey costs €6.35 and passes through citrus groves and then proper mountains; hire cars sit unused in the station car park all week. There is no cash machine in Navajas—bring euros, because Bar Altomira's card machine fails when the wind blows. The nearest ATM is ten minutes up the CV-35 in Soneja, but that's a long walk for a beer you can't pay for.

Accommodation is limited: nine rooms in the nineteenth-century Hotel Fuentemar, a clutch of rural cottages, and a riverside campsite where the waterfall lulls you to sleep. Pitches cost €18 including hot showers; shaded sites by the river go quickly at Easter.

When Things Go Wrong

Assume no taxi rank exists. If you miss the last train (19:30 on weekdays, earlier on Sundays) phone Radio Taxi Segorbe (+34 679 433 093) the day before; fare to Navajas is about €25. Mobile reception is patchy in the gorge—download offline maps. After heavy rain the waterfall path floods; check the town-hall Facebook page for closures. And if you turn up on a Monday with a carload of hungry walkers, stock up in Jerica first—Navajas's mini-market opens only when the owner feels like it.

Leave before sunset and you'll miss the best moment: when the day trippers depart, swifts wheel above the church tower and the water channels chatter louder than the traffic. Stay for that last beer on the terrace, watch the limestone glow pink, and the 20:07 train will already be sounding its horn down in the orchard—an easy timetable to keep, if you can tear yourself away.