Ajalvir

Ajalvir sits 35 kilometres north-east of Madrid at 700 metres above sea level, high enough for the air to feel thinner than the capital but not quite high enough for pine trees. The cereal fields that surround it roll like a beige carpet in late summer, then flip to improbable emerald after April showers. This is the meseta—Spain’s central plateau—where the horizon keeps its distance and the sierra appears only as a charcoal smudge on clear days.

Most foreign visitors race past on the M-21 motorway, bound for the airport hotels of Barajas or the prettier wine towns of the Henares valley. Ajalvir has never asked them to stop. Its population of 4,800 keeps Spanish hours: shutters down at 14:00, streets empty until 17:30, then a slow refill of terraza tables outside the four bars that frame Plaza de la Constitución. The square itself is a working space, not a postcard—banks, chemist, parish noticeboard—yet it still functions as the village lungs. On Saturday mornings the mobile fruit van honks twice and pensioners queue with wheeled baskets; by 13:00 the van is gone and the square smells of diesel and thyme from someone’s garden.

What passes for sights

The 16th-century church of San Pedro Apóstol is the only building older than Franco. Its bell tower leans two degrees west, a tilt you notice only after staring long enough to annoy the swifts. Inside, the nave is a patchwork: Baroque plaster, neo-Romanesque columns, 1970s electric candles. The priest unlocks it ten minutes before the Saturday evening mass; at other times you can try the side door, but don’t expect stained glass or air-con. What you do get is silence thick enough to hear the woodworm.

Everything else is post-1980s brick and render, the result of speculative building that doubled the village size during Spain’s property boom. The architectural high point, locals joke, is the brick arch at the entrance to the municipal pool. They are only half joking: the pool (open mid-June to early September, €3 a day) is the one place English visitors mention online with something approaching enthusiasm. It is a proper Olympic-length basin, surrounded by lawn and a concrete terrace where teenagers play reggaetón from tinny speakers. Bring a £1 coin for the locker; the mechanism hasn’t changed since 1998.

Walking the meseta

Leave the last cul-de-sac at the north edge and you are instantly in countryside. The GR-300 footpath skirts wheat fields and chicken sheds before joining the old drovers’ route that once took cattle to summer pastures. There is no shade—only the occasional poplar planted as a windbreak—so start early. In April the soil smells of rain and iron; by July it is dust and hot metal. You will share the track with tractors and the odd mountain-biker from Madrid testing thigh muscles. After 5 km the path drops to the Jarama river, where willows give relief and kingfishers flash turquoise if you stand still long enough.

Cyclists can loop south-east to Cobeña and back (18 km), mostly on concrete farm roads. Road bikes cope; hybrids are better. The gradient never rises above 3 %, but the wind can be savage—carry water because the only bar between villages closes without warning if grandfather is ill.

Eating (and the lack of choice)

British palates survive here if they avoid culinary ambition. Villa Ajalvir restaurant, next to the eponymous hotel on the M-21 roundabout, serves a €14 menú del día that begins with iceberg lettuce and ends with slab of flan. The middle course is reliably grilled chicken or, if you ask nicely, a plate of eggs and chips. Locals treat it as the village canteen; businessmen in open collars conduct loud phone meetings while the television shows horse-racing on mute.

For something sweeter, Cafetería El Parque opens at 06:30 so farm workers can down a cortado before dawn. By 10:30 the same counter sells churros—straight doughnuts with a cup of thick chocolate that tastes like Cadbury’s on steroids. Children like it because it is familiar junk food in unfamiliar liquid form. There is no vegetarian restaurant, no gastropub, no sourdough. If you need oat milk, bring it yourself.

When the village parties

Ajalvir wakes up three times a year. The patronal fiestas of San Pedro (last weekend of June) begin with a rock-concert-in-a-tent that can be heard in the next province. Fairground rides occupy the football pitch; teenage Brits on au-pair exchanges discover how Spanish pop sounds when filtered through €3 cans of San Miguel. Mid-August brings the verbenas—open-air dances where grandparents teach toddlers to clap on the off-beat. Expect fireworks at 02:00; expect the last bus to Madrid to have left at 22:00.

The quietest festival is the Mayos on 1 May: residents place flower-strewn altars outside front doors, then wander with guitars singing couplets that praise the spring and mock the neighbours. It is gentle, slightly dotty, and finished by 23:00—perfect if you have an early flight.

Getting stuck (or not)

There is no railway. From Madrid-Barajas Terminal 4, bus 256 leaves hourly, takes 45 minutes and costs €2. The last return is 22:00 sharp; miss it and a taxi costs €50. Hire cars are simpler: take the A-2 towards Zaragoza, exit at km 28, follow signs for “polígono industrial” then “centro urbano”. Parking is free and usually empty except fiesta weekends.

Accommodation is limited. Villa Ajalvir hotel has 19 motel-style rooms with pool access; TripAdvisor rates it 2.9/5, the dragging score caused mainly by thin walls and a breakfast buffet that runs out of coffee by 09:15. Hospedería de Antonia offers three rooms above a bakery—cleaner, quieter, but you must check in before 21:00 when the owner goes to bingo. Prices hover around €60 a night mid-week, €85 during fiestas. Neither accepts pets; both have rock-hard mattresses that only a Spaniard could love.

The honest verdict

Ajalvir will never compete with Segovia’s aqueduct or El Escorial’s monastery. It is a satellite village that forgot to suburbanise its soul. Come if you need a cheap bed before an early flight, stay an extra morning if you are curious about how Madrid’s countryside actually lives. Walk the wheat tracks, swim in the pool, drink a caña while the plaza soundtrack switches from church bells to reggaetón and back. Then catch the 19:00 bus to the city, because two hours is plenty—and the village would agree.