Muro en Cameros

The thermometer outside the stone cottage reads nine degrees at midday in late May. That’s not a typo—Muro en Cameros sits at 1,104 m, high enough for the air to pinch even when Logroño, 45 km away, is nudging 25 °C. Jackets stay on, the kettle goes on more often than the fan, and the village’s 35 permanent residents treat central heating as a year-round insurance policy rather than a winter luxury.

A village that ends where it begins

Most British visitors arrive expecting a cluster of honey-coloured houses and a bar dispensing tapas. Muro refuses to cooperate. There is no square to linger in, no souvenir rack, no café terrace facing a photogenic church. Instead, three short lanes of grey stone and curved terracotta tiles climb a rib of the Sierra de Cameros, stop abruptly at a cattle grid, and surrender to forest. You can walk from one end to the other in four minutes—five if you pause to read the 1920s inscription above the bakery that closed before the Civil War.

The architecture is functional rather than pretty: thick walls to blunt the north wind, tiny windows to keep out summer heat, roofs pitched steeply so snow slides off before it collapses the beams. Look closely and you’ll spot masons’ marks and iron rings where animals were once tethered overnight. The parish church of San Pedro sits slightly off-centre, its bell tower doubling as the only vertical reference point for miles. Inside, a single nave, a Christ figure carved from poplar, and a priest’s chair worn smooth by centuries of woollen robes. If it’s locked, ask at the third house on the left; the key lives in a biscuit tin behind the geraniums.

Forest before breakfast

Leave the last cottage behind and the landscape opens like a book. A stony track drops into an oak hollow, then forks: left for the river Leza gorge, right for the Abejera pass. Both are way-marked with splashes of yellow and white paint that fade quickly in mountain weather. You don’t need an Ordnance Survey fetish to enjoy them; thirty minutes either way delivers views across layered ridges that change colour every hour—bright green after rain, khaki by July, rust-red once the beeches turn in October.

Wildlife is shy but plentiful. Roe deer step onto the path at dawn, wild boar root up the verges at dusk, and Griffon vultures circle overhead like paper planes. Bring binoculars and patience; the forest rewards those who stand still. There are no entrance fees, no visitor centres, no interpretation boards telling you how to feel. Just silence, occasionally broken by a chainsaw or a distant dog whose bark echoes for miles.

Food, or the lack of it

Muro does not do lunch. The nearest shop is 12 km away in Montenegro de Cameros; the nearest bar that serves hot food is 18 km in San Román de Cameros. Pack sandwiches, fill a flask, and treat the village as a picnic spot with medieval walls. If you insist on a proper meal, drive twenty-five minutes to Villanueva de Arbeiza where Casa Cosme dishes out roast suckling lamb (€22 a portion) and a decent Rioja crianza by the glass.

Buy supplies in Logroño before you leave the A-68. Cheese from the market hall, chorizo that doesn’t come vacuum-packed, and something green to offset all that protein. A cool box helps; ambient temperatures in the mountains can be ten degrees lower than the car park at Sainsbury’s back home.

Getting there without the drama

From Bilbao ferry port it’s 135 km—two hours if you resist the urge to photograph every gorge. Take the AP-68 to Logroño, peel off onto the N-111 towards Soria, then swing left onto the LR-333 after the wind-turbine ridge. The final 22 km twist through beech woods sharp enough to trigger car-sickness. Fuel up beforehand; petrol stations are rarer than honest politicians once you leave the dual carriageway. In winter carry snow chains even if the forecast claims “light frost”; the road climbs 400 m in the last ten minutes and black ice appears suddenly in the shade.

No buses run to Muro. A taxi from Logroño costs around €70 each way—cheaper only if you split the fare four ways. Car hire is essential unless you fancy hitch-hiking with a shepherd.

When to bother turning up

Spring arrives late; daffodils appear in April, not February. By late May the meadows are knee-high with buttercups and the night temperature finally stays above five degrees. Autumn is the photographer’s window: clear air, scarlet beech leaves, and the smell of wood smoke at dusk. Summer is doable—daytime highs of 24 °C feel pleasant after the Meseta furnace—but nights drop to 10 °C, so bring a fleece even in August. January can hit minus twelve; unless you enjoy scraping ice from the inside of windscreens, leave the village to the locals and the wild boar.

Rain is not an if but a when. The Sierra de Cameros traps Atlantic weather and squeezes it dry. Paths turn to chocolate pudding within minutes; walking boots with decent tread are non-negotiable. If the sky bruises over, retreat to the car and drive the scenic loop through Viniegra de Arriba and Jalón de Cameros—both have covered porticoes where you can wait out a shower without looking like a drowned tourist.

The honest verdict

Muro en Cameros will not change your life. You will not tick off a UNESCO site, nor will you brag about Michelin stars. What you get is volume control—real, restorative quiet—and a landscape that demands nothing except you look up occasionally. Stay two hours and you’ll have seen it; stay half a day and you might understand why some of the stone houses are slowly being rebuilt by weekenders from Madrid who value silence above Waitrose deliveries.

Come as part of a wider loop through La Rioja’s higher villages: Enciso for dinosaur footprints, Torrecilla sobre Alesanco for its wine co-op, Muro for the hush in between. Treat it like a National Trust car park without the gift shop—somewhere to stretch your legs, breathe air that hasn’t been recirculated through a plane cabin, and remember that Spain can still do emptiness remarkably well.