Monforte de Lemos

The first thing that strikes you is the tower. Not a fairy-tale spire, but a blunt 13th-century keep planted on a granite outcrop like someone dropped a chess piece from a great height. From the train window it looms above the valley, announcing Monforte de Lemos long before the carriage wheezes into the single-platform station. Most passengers are bound for Santiago; a handful hop off here, blinking in the bright Galician light, wondering if they've made a mistake. They haven't.

A Town That Looks Down on Itself

Monforte sits 400 metres above sea level where the river Cabe coils through vineyards and chestnut woods. The old centre is basically one large hillside carpentry accident: houses stacked on houses, lanes tilting at angles that would give a surveyor hiccups. Park at the first sensible spot you see (the free gravel area below the Parador works) and walk. Attempting to drive into the medieval core is a game of chicken with stone walls and resident grandmothers who refuse to break stride.

Start with the climb to San Vicente. It's steep, takes ten minutes if you're fit, twenty if you're honest, and the reward is a 360-degree ledger of the town's history. South: the railway line and industrial estate. North: a sea of green terraces stitched with narrow roads that corkscrew down to the Ribeira Sacra wine country. West: the Renaissance bulk of the Colegio de Nuestra Señora da Antigua, nicknamed the "Galician Escorial" by over-enthusiastic guides. Ignore the hyperbole; the building is impressive enough without it. Step inside for the courtyard ringed by Doric columns and a church whose ceiling looks like an enormous stone tent. El Greco's Annunciation hangs in the adjoining museum, though the gallery opens only for guided tours at midday and four, and they limit numbers to twenty. Arrive early, queue politely, and remember to turn your phone off—staff have no qualms about ejecting offenders.

River, Bridge and Lunch

Drop back down to the Puente Viejo, the old bridge whose earliest arches date from Roman times but have been rebuilt so often they should offer loyalty cards. Cross it at dusk when swifts stitch the air above the water and the sandstone glows nicotine-yellow in the low sun. On the far bank a riverside path leads to a modest playa fluvial—essentially a manicured river-beach with duck ponds and picnic tables. In July locals sprint here after work; the water is cold enough to make a Highland stream feel tepid, but when the valley hits 35 °C you'll join them.

Back in the centre, Plaza de España is where the town conducts its daily business under soportales—stone arcades that keep rain and sun off grocery bags and gossip. Cafés charge €1.30 for a café con leche, €2 if you sit outside under the clock tower. Sunday lunchtime starts at two and the menu del día rarely exceeds €14. Expect pulpo a feira (octopus dressed in olive oil and smoky paprika), empanada stuffed with cockles or salt cod, and a bowl of caldo gallego thick enough to stand a spoon in. Wine comes from vineyards you drove past an hour ago; the local mencía is light, acidic and tastes better after the second glass.

Using Monforte as a Springboard

Stay the night. Accommodation splits into three camps: the Parador in the converted monastery (book a monastery-facing room, not the 1990s annex), family-run pensións around the old town, and roadside hostels on the industrial fringe. Prices hover around €85 for the Parador low season, €50 for a decent double with breakfast elsewhere. August doubles everything and sells out early thanks to the Empanada Festival, a riot of pastry and lampreys that transforms quiet streets into a standing-room-only buffet.

Morning. Hire a car, because buses to the Ribeira Sacra can kindly be described as theoretical. Within 25 minutes you can be standing on a mirador staring down 500-metre cliffs at the river Sil coiling between terraced vineyards that pre-date the Romans. Mist often hides the water until nine, then lifts like theatre gauze to reveal boats the size of ants. The main viewpoints—Balcones de Madrid, Cabo do Mundo, Castro Caldelas—are signposted only when you reach them; before that you're at the mercy of sat-nav which thinks goat tracks are B-roads. Stick to the N120 towards Ourense and follow brown signs rather than the "scenic" short-cuts if you dislike sheer drops without barriers.

Catamaran trips run from Embarcadeiro do Sil, April to October, €14 for 75 minutes. Engines are quiet enough for kingfishers to ignore, and the guides speak Spanish with the occasional Galician noun thrown in to keep purists happy. English commentary is non-existent; download a translation app or simply watch the cliffs slide past like a living geology lesson.

What Monforte Won't Give You

This isn't Santiago. You won't queue behind German backpackers to kiss a silver saint, nor stumble upon Celtic pipe bands busking for coins. Nightlife is a handful of bars where the music stops at half-one because the owner's mother lives upstairs. Souvenir choice is limited to the corkscrews and embroidered tea-towels sold in the tiny craft shop beside the tourist office. The town museum is closed for restoration more often than not, and the leaflet promises "future interactive displays" with the optimism of a seaside postcard.

Rain can arrive horizontally in April and linger for days. In winter the valley traps fog so thick you could grate it. Summer, on the other hand, is surprisingly dry; locals complain the air "weighs like an anvil" and head for the river after work. August temperatures breach 38 °C, yet altitude keeps nights tolerable—perfect for sitting on the Parador terrace with a glass of godello, watching spotlights pick out the tower you climbed that morning.

Getting Out Again

Trains to Santiago depart twice daily, taking two hours via Ourense. Buy tickets online for Promo fares (around €12). If you're walking the Camino de Invierno—the winter alternative to the overcrowded French Route—Monforte is the first place with a proper supermarket and a launderette after 29 km of empty forest. Pilgrims stock up on plasters and bocadillos, then linger longer than planned, surprised to find a town that functions for locals first and visitors second.

Leave before you're ready. That's the sign of a good stopover. From the train the tower shrinks, the vineyards blur, and you realise Monforte de Lemos has given you exactly what you didn't know you needed: a working Spanish town content to be itself, plus one of Europe's wildest wine regions at the end of its streets.