Táliga

The church bell strikes nine as tractors cough to life below. From Taliga's modest 315-metre ridge, the view stretches across the Llanos de Olivenza – a caramel-coloured quilt of dehesa and olive groves that runs uninterrupted to the Portuguese border thirty kilometres west. At this altitude, the air carries a snap absent on the plains; even in August, mornings arrive with a softness that makes walking pleasant.

Six hundred souls live here, enough to support a single bar, a bakery that opens when the owner feels like it, and a tiny shop selling tinned tuna, washing powder, and local cheese wrapped in waxed paper. The village occupies a limestone outcrop, which explains why the streets slope gently from the 16th-century parish church down to the agricultural co-op. Houses follow the contour: one-storey at the top, two-storey at the bottom, all whitewashed and trimmed in cobalt blue or oxidised green. Paint fades quickly at this height; owners repaint every spring, so by October facades have already developed the weather-beaten patina photographers love.

Walking the Edge Between Village and Wilderness

Taliga measures eight hundred metres from end to end. You can cross it in twelve minutes, yet the place keeps revealing itself. Start at the church, note the stone blocks pillaged from nearby Olivenza after the 1640 wars, then drift downhill past doorways where morning glories twine around horseshoes. Residents leave front doors open; glance inside and you'll see marble-topped tables, Catholic calendars, and the inevitable television flickering in a back room. By ten o'clock the sun clears the church tower and shadows shrink to nothing; shutters slam shut against the heat.

The real transition happens at the last houses. Here asphalt crumbles into a dirt track that splits the dehesa – ancient cork oak pasture where black Iberian pigs graze between acorn seasons. Follow any path for five minutes and village sounds fade: no dogs, no tractors, only grasshoppers and the occasional buzzard mewing overhead. The ground rises and falls like a gentle swell, never steeper than a Surrey footpath, but the openness feels continental, almost African. Bring water; there's no shade until the next hamlet seven kilometres on.

Circular routes exist. The most straightforward heads south-east towards the abandoned cortijo of Los Llanos, a two-hour round trip across wheat stubble and olive terraces. Spring brings carpets of purple orchids and the risk of shoe-sucking mud after rain; autumn offers ochre landscapes and migrating storks gliding south on thermals. Summer walking is possible only before eleven or after five; midday temperatures regularly top forty degrees, and the Guardia Civil occasionally evacuate overheated foreigners who underestimated the exposure.

What Arrives on the Back of a Pick-Up

Food culture here runs on barter and timing. Ask in the bar and someone will mention that José has slaughtered a pig, or that María's goats are producing again. The Saturday market in Olivenza – twelve kilometres away – supplies what Taliga can't: fresh fish on ice, mangoes trucked from Andalucía, and the British Sunday papers if you arrive before noon. Back in the village, the bakery produces a limited batch of molletes (soft white rolls) at dawn; regulars buy them warm, clutching paper bags that leave translucent grease spots on car seats.

Eating out means the bar. Breakfast is tostada rubbed with tomato and oil, served with café con leche in glasses that burn your fingers. Lunch appears at two: today perhaps cocido of chickpeas and pork fat, tomorrow a plate of fried eggs over chips doused in pimentón. Dinner service stops at nine sharp; arrive late and you'll get crisps and apologies. Prices feel stuck in 2010: €1.20 for coffee, €8 for the menú del día including wine that arrives in a reused plastic bottle. Vegetarians manage tortilla; vegans should pack supplies.

If you self-cater, track down Quesería Extremadura, a family dairy hidden behind the petrol station on the BA-037. They craft torta de la Serena from raw Merino sheep's milk – a runny, pungent cheese wrapped in cloth that must be eaten within weeks. Buy one for €12 and it'll dominate the car for days, seeping through the box like a guilty secret.

When the Fiesta Drums Start at Midnight

Fiesta calendar pivots around summer. The patronal celebrations in mid-July import fairground rides and a temporary bullring constructed from scaffolding and plywood. Streets fill with second cousins from Madrid; teenagers clutch litre bottles of calimocho and debate whose parents are stricter. At two in the morning the brass band strikes up, marching between houses to wake the devout for the dawn procession. Light sleepers should book elsewhere – the noise carries uphill on warm air.

Easter proceeds at a more reflective pace. Thursday night's silent procession features thirty robed figures carrying lanterns; only the shuffle of feet and the occasional sob break the darkness. Visitors are welcome but not catered for: no seating, no commentary, just stand at the edge and keep quiet. Afterwards everyone squeezes into the bar for anise and mantecados, crumbly lard biscuits that coat your mouth like sweetened chalk.

Autumn brings the matanza, technically illegal under EU rules but tolerated as cultural heritage. Families still gather to slaughter a pig, sharing the work of butchery and the subsequent feast of fresh morcilla and fried liver. Tourists occasionally blunder into these events expecting a photo opportunity; they're met with polite refusal and a reminder that this is dinner, not Disney.

Getting Here, Staying Sane

No train reaches Taliga. From the UK, fly to Lisbon (two hours from London, then a two-hour drive east) or Seville (ninety-minute flight plus ninety-minute drive north). Car hire is essential; buses from Badajoz run twice daily except Sundays, dropping you at the crossroads with a twelve-minute uphill walk. Roads narrow alarmingly after Olivenza: single-track with passing places, stone walls on both sides, and the occasional loose bullock. Sat-nav loses signal in the valley; download offline maps before leaving the motorway.

Accommodation within the village amounts to La Casa de Adela, two spotless rooms above a private house, sharing a plunge pool open round the clock. €60 a night includes biscuits and instant coffee; bring milk if you dislike black. The alternative is Heredero Hotel, twelve miles away, where reviews mention stained carpets and a breakfast of packaged sponge cake. Better to stay in Olivenza's fortified town and drive up for the day.

Weather catches people out. At 315 metres, Taliga sits just high enough for winter frosts that kill geraniums overnight. January days can be glorious – 18°C at midday – but night-time plummets to freezing. Summer offers the inverse: 35°C shade temperatures and skies so clear that stars punch through like holes in black paper. Spring and autumn provide the sweet spot, though Easter week has delivered horizontal rain for three years running. Check the forecast, then pack the opposite.

Leave before you run out of things to do; Taliga rewards brevity. Two hours buys the church, the streets, and a twenty-minute stroll into the dehesa. Half a day lets you lunch at the bar, photograph white walls against red earth, and buy cheese for the journey home. Stay longer and you'll start recognising everyone's dogs, start being asked why you're still here. The village functions perfectly without visitors; tourism is tolerated, not required. Enjoy the altitude, the silence, and the knowledge that by nightfall the place will have reset itself, ready for tomorrow's tractors and the slow grind of agricultural time.