Villarta de los Montes

The village bakery opens at seven, but the bread is still warm at half past. By then the first griffon vultures are already airborne, turning slow circles above the slate roofs of Villarta de los Montes. From the mirador outside the cemetery wall you can watch them ride the same thermal that lifts the smell of yeast and woodsmoke up the hillside. It is a quiet alarm clock, and the 403 residents have long since stopped noticing.

A grid of whitewash and wrought iron

Villarta sits at 551 m on the eastern lip of Badajoz province, where the province’s name changes to La Siberia and the roads narrow to a single stripe of tarmac between stone walls. The houses are low, thick-walled, painted the colour of old ivory. Geraniums erupt from olive-oil tins on balconies; every third door is painted ox-blood red, the paint bubbled by decades of sun. There is no plaza mayor in the usual sense, just a widening of the main street where the church of San Bartolomé stands sideways to the traffic, as if it turned its back on the twentieth century and forgot to turn again.

Inside, the church is cool and plain. A single baroque altar piece glints dully in the gloom, but the real attraction is the roof—original Moorish tile, curved like a row of terracotta books. Mass is at eleven on Sundays; visitors are welcome, though the priest still gives the sermon in the rapid Extremaduran accent that even Madrilène Spanish speakers struggle to follow.

Footprints across the dehesa

Walk fifty paces past the last street lamp and you are in the dehesa, the cork-and-holm-oak savannah that covers most of the district. Stone terraces built during the short-lived 1950s wheat boom crumble quietly into rabbit burrows; the earth smells of thyme and sheep’s wool. Footpaths here are not marketed as “senderos”: they are simply the tracks farmers use to check on the free-range pigs that supply the local jamón. Download the free IGN map before you set out—waymarking is sporadic and a five-kilometre stroll has a habit of turning into a twelve-kilometre yomp once you factor in the detours around electrified stock fences.

The reward is space. From the ridge known locally as Los Tres Mojones you can see west to the granite bulk of the Sierra de Guadalupe and east across the reservoir chain of the Guadiana. Dawn is the best time: the air is sharp enough to make you reach for a fleece, and the only sound is the soft clink of distant cowbells. Bring binoculars—griffon and Egyptian vultures share the thermals with golden eagles, and the reintroduced Iberian lynx has been photographed less than ten kilometres away. Actually seeing one is lottery-jackpot territory, but fresh prints in the dust are common enough to keep hopes cautiously alive.

What passes for a food scene

There are two bars and no restaurants. Bar Manchego Felipe y Noe, on the corner opposite the chemist, serves grilled pork shoulder (plato de magro) on chipped white plates big enough to double as shields. A half-portion feeds two; a full portion has been known to defeat teenage rugby teams. Order it with a jarra of local beer—Estrella de Extremadura, brewed in nearby Don Benito—and you will be charged €8.50. They close at ten, earlier if Felipe’s granddaughter has a school play.

For breakfast El Andaluz does a respectable tostada con tomate: half a village loaf rubbed with tomato, doused with peppery olive oil, and served with a cafè con leche for €2.30. The coffee is strong enough to erase the previous evening’s bottle of Ribera del Guadiana, stocked behind the bar at supermarket prices. Neither establishment accepts cards with any reliability; the village ATM is equally temperamental, so fill your wallet in Herrera del Duque, 25 minutes down the EX-118.

If you are self-catering, the tiny Ultramarinos San Bartolomé stocks tinned tuna, UHT milk, and excellent local honey sold in un-labelled screw-top jars. The honey is mild, almost buttery, and passes UK customs without a quibble. Sunday shopping is impossible—the shop shuts at two and stays shut on Monday.

Water, but no coast

Villarta has no beach, but it does have El Castañar, a mountain pool dammed by Romans and refashioned by the council in 1998. The water is dark, cold, and deep enough to jump from the upstream rocks. Spanish families arrive with cool boxes and parasols at eleven sharp; by midday the single-track car park is grid-locked and the water full of inflatable dinosaurs. Arrive early, or walk the five kilometres from the village and earn your swim. There is no bus, no taxi rank, and the road is too narrow for confident British drivers to attempt a three-point turn when they meet an oncoming tractor.

When to come, when to stay away

Spring and autumn are the sweet spots. April brings drifts of white cistus flowers along the paths; October paints the oaks copper and drops the night temperature to fleece level. Both seasons offer 22 °C afternoons and chilly dawns—perfect walking weather. Summer is a different proposition: July and August regularly touch 40 °C by mid-afternoon, and the village empties into the shade of interior courtyards. Even the vultures sit out the heat, hunched on dead branches like damp umbrellas.

Winter is crisp, often sunny, and can deliver a dusting of snow that melts by lunchtime. The trade-off is shorter daylight and the possibility that the EX-118 will be closed by rockfall after heavy rain. Carry a blanket and a thermos if you are driving over from Badajoz—Spanish roadside assistance regards these hills as “remote” and charges accordingly.

The practical bits, without the brochure speak

Accommodation is limited. Three village houses have been restored into self-catering casas rurales; expect stone floors, wood-burning stoves, and Wi-Fi that flickers whenever the wind blows from the north. Prices hover around €90 a night for a two-bedroom house, linen included. Book through the regional tourist board site—Airbnb has yet to discover Villarta, which is either a blessing or a problem depending on your attitude to online reviews.

Petrol: fill up in Herrera del Duque or Don Benito. The village garage closed in 2011 and the nearest 24-hour station is 45 minutes south at Castuera.

Phone signal: EE and Vodafone work on the lower streets; above the church you drop into “SOS only”. Download Google Maps offline before you leave the main road.

Nightlife: zero. After the bars close the only illumination comes from the street lamp outside the town hall and the green glow of the church clock. Bring a book, or sit on the mirador and listen for wild boar rustling below the crags.

Leaving without a souvenir

You will not find fridge magnets. The bakery might sell you an extra loaf for the journey; wrap it in a tea towel and it will still be edible two days later in Cáceres. The real keepsake is the silence that settles once you switch the engine back on and roll down the hill towards the N-430. In the rear-view mirror Villarta shrinks to a white line on a brown ridge, the vultures still circling, the bread cooling on someone’s windowsill, and the day already stretching into the kind of quiet that most of Britain forgot sometime around 1955.