Valle de Matamoros

At 609 metres above sea level, Valle de Matamoros wakes before the sun. The first sound isn't traffic or church bells, but the faint clink of cowbells moving through dehesa oakland that begins at the edge of the village square. By 7am, someone is already sweeping the grit from last night's wind off their doorstep. Smoke drifts from a single chimney. The day starts whether you're ready or not.

This is Extremadura's Sierra Suroeste, 140km west of Mérida and only 35km from the Portuguese border, yet it feels farther from anywhere that appears on a postcard. The 344 inhabitants don't describe the place as "unspoilt" – they call it work. Cattle graze the same slopes their grandfathers fought to clear, and the butcher still knows whose steer you're buying by the cut.

Stone, Oak and the Smell of Woodsmoke

The village tumbles down a ridge in a jumble of whitewashed walls and terracotta roofs. There are no traffic lights, no boutique hotels, and the nearest cash machine is 18km away in Jerez de los Caballeros. What you get instead are lanes wide enough for a single donkey cart, granite doorways carved in 1783, and the Parish church of San Juan Bautista, a plain granite box whose bell tower doubles as the mobile-phone mast.

Walk uphill past the church and the houses thin out. Within five minutes you're among holm oaks and cork trees whose trunks are still stripped every nine years for wine stoppers. The paths aren't signed in four languages; they're the same livestock tracks that funneled sheep north to León long before Spain was a country. Follow one for twenty minutes and you'll pass a stone water trough fed by a clay pipe, a charcoal burner's circular hut, and a meadow where fighting bulls stare as if you've interrupted a meeting.

Spring brings nightingales and the smell of broom. Summer turns the grass the colour of pale ale and sends thermals of scent from wild thyme and rosemary. Autumn is mushroom season: locals head out at dawn with wicker baskets and return with níscalos that taste of pine and smoke. Winter bites. Frost feathers the inside of single-glazed windows and the village sits under a cold white breath that can linger for days. Come prepared: Extremadura holds Spain's temperature records for both heat and cold.

Food That Apologises to No One

Meals are built around what the land gives, not what looks pretty on Instagram. Order the cocido in Bar La Sierra and you get a clay bowl of chickpeas, morcilla blood sausage and panceta that keeps its shape only long enough to reach the table. The house wine is from Tierra de Barros, 50km east, and costs €2.20 a glass – poured from a plastic litre bottle kept in the fridge because no one sees the point of decanting it.

If you want to cook, the tiny Ultramarinos opposite the pharmacy stocks local jamón at €38 a kilo, vacuum-packed queso de oveja that will stink out the car, and chorizo spiced with pimentón de la Vera smoked over holm-oak fires. Ask for three slices of jamón and the shopkeeper will want to know how many days you're staying: "If it's two, take 200g; any more and you'll be back tomorrow."

Game appears on menus between October and February. Wild boar stew tastes of juniper and bay; partridge is braised with onion and a splash of brandy from a bottle with no label. Vegetarians survive on tortilla and salads heavy with canned tuna – the village hasn't embraced meat-free Mondays yet.

Walking Without Waymarkers

Valle de Matamoros doesn't do themed trails. What it offers is 360 degrees of country laced with old drove roads called cañadas. Park at the Plaza de España, fill a bottle at the stone fountain, and head south on the track signed simply "Portugal 22km". Within forty minutes you're on the 400-metre contour with views west to the Sierra de San Pedro and east across rolling dehesa that looks unchanged since Roman pigs rooted for acorns.

A circular route of 12km takes in the ruined cortijo of El Carrascalejo, a spring where shepherds still fill plastic jerrycans, and a ridge where griffon vultures ride thermals at eye level. The going is easy – sheep don't like steep hills – but wear boots after rain: clay mixed with oak leaves becomes a skating rink. In summer start early; by 11am the temperature can touch 36°C and shade is limited to the width of an oak trunk.

Night walks are different. No streetlights mean the Milky Way competes with the village glow from one cluster of windows. Take a torch for the rougher sections, but switch it off once your eyes adjust. You'll hear owls, the shuffle of cattle bedding down, and – if the wind's right – someone practising the snare drum for next month's fiesta.

When the Village Lets Its Hair Down

Fiestas patronales arrive the second weekend of August. The population quadruples as emigrants drive back from Madrid and Barcelona. A soundstage appears overnight in the square, competing with the bar terrace that spills across the road. Fireworks echo off granite walls at 2am; nobody thinks to apologise. Saturday's highlight is the running of young bulls through the streets – not Pamplona, but still enough to make travel-insurance underwriters wince. Sunday dawns with a communal paella cooked in a pan two metres wide; you pay €5 for a plate and sit where you can find space.

The matanza in January is invitation-only. Families slaughter one pig, share the work, and divide 120 kilos of meat into hams, loins and chorizos that hang in attics for the rest of the year. If you're staying in a self-catering cottage and the owner likes you, expect a gift of fresh morcilla wrapped in newspaper. Fry it with onion and a splash of local red – breakfast that keeps you walking until dusk.

Getting There, Staying Put

Public transport is theoretical. The Monday bus from Badajoz reaches the village at 14:37 and leaves again at 15:00 – enough time for a coffee and not much else. Hire a car at Mérida or Seville airports; the drive takes 90 minutes and the last 30km twist through sierra roads where goats have right of way. Petrol is 10 cents cheaper in Spain than Portugal, so fill up before you leave the A66 motorway.

Accommodation is limited to three rural houses sleeping four to eight. Casa Rural La Dehesa (€90 a night for the whole house) has thick stone walls, Wi-Fi that remembers dial-up, and a roof terrace where you can watch the sun drop behind Portugal. Bring groceries; the village shop closes at 13:30 and doesn't reopen until 17:00. If you need cash, the pharmacy will advance up to €50 on a UK card, but they'll want to see your passport and possibly hear your life story.

Phone signal is patchy outside the village centre; Vodafone and Orange fare better than EE partners. Download offline maps before you leave the UK, and tell someone your walking route – the Guardia Civil mountain rescue post is 45km away in Hornachos.

Valle de Matamoros won't change your life. It will, however, reset your watch to a rhythm where siesta is negotiable but feeding the cattle is not, and where the night sky still has the decency to be dark. Bring walking boots, a sense of curiosity, and a stomach ready for proper portions. Leave the phrasebook Spanish behind; here they speak extremeño, fast and soft, but a smile and "buenos días" still open more doors than any app.