Day 4 – Tramacastiel to Jabaloyas

After a good night’s sleep with no disturbances from the local witches, I went for breakfast only to discover that I was virtually the last guest to come down, meaning that everybody else was served before me (the owner was again working alone as the evening before). As a result, with breakfast starting at 9, I didn’t get underway until 10. Not great when you have around 25 km to hike. And the breakfast itself was pretty light, just two slices of toasted bread with butter and jam, and a cup of coffee. Fortunately, I had a stock of dried food with me for lunch.

The church bells were chiming 10 o’clock as I left the hotel and headed along the lush Tramacastiel valley, following a trail devised by Komoot that would meet up with my original trail just after the village of Rubiales. And this trail did indeed take me towards the narrow gorge that I had seen on my way down the previous day. But I had the pleasant surprise of discovering that a clear and well marked trail led up the side of it.

The trail was as stony as ever, but, after four days, I was getting used to this kind of terrain, and the path was very easy to follow for once. As I moved higher, in the rock face opposite, I saw walls of what must have once been sheepfolds, indicating that there was once a lot more activity in this area than there is now.

At the top of the climb, just before the trail turned onto a dirt road, there was a small memorial dedicated to a certain Juan Julio Vilatela, who had died suddenly on this spot in 1884. No cause of death was marked, so it was left up to me to imagine what might have happened: a bolt of lightning, a heart attack, a witches’ curse… It could’ve been anything.

From this point on, the rest of the morning was pretty unremarkable with a long slog of about 10 km along a dirt road to join up with the original trial. So unremarkable, that I don’t have a single photo of it.

Shortly before joining the original trail, I actually saw some other human beings for once, the first encountered on the trails. Three guys working in an almond grove. It was around 1 PM at that point. They had clearly finished for the day and, just after I passed them, they drove off along the dirt road, probably on their way to a good lunch somewhere.

My lunch was an entirely different matter. I found a shady spot about two km after joining up with the trail and opted to try one of the dried meals that I bought with me. A potato salad with vegetables. I closely followed the instructions and let it rehydrate for 20 minutes. On sampling it, I felt it needed at least another 20 minutes. But even after 40, it was still pretty dry and horrible. Luckily, for dessert, I had some dehydrated stewed apples that were absolutely delicious. I hoped that the other two meals I had with me would prove to be tastier.

Shortly after my break, after passing what seemed to be a deserted farm (even though the fields around had clearly been sown with wheat), I began to follow a road that led me through the magnificent Rodeno pine forest. This was a wonderful, peaceful area and, even though it was Sunday afternoon, there wasn’t a soul around.

Then, on emerging from the forest, I encountered a number of intriguing rock formations, the Rodeno rocks, which are apparently pretty famous within the climbing community. We have plenty of boulders near home in the Fontainebleau forest, but nothing quite as spectacular as these. But, there too there was no one around, even though I had expected to find a few climbers.

Just after the rocks, the trail took a sharp right turn, and, after a brief descent, I began a steep 300 m climb to the ridge above Jabaloyas. As the hotel owner described it later, it was one of those climbs that never seems to end. Whenever I thought I was getting to the top, there was still a bit further to go. The terrain was a stony as ever, but at least the trail was easy to follow. It was a huge relief to reach the top and see the village below.

From the ridge, there was an initially stony, then a grassy descent to the village itself where I arrived at around 6 PM, not bad, given the late start, the long rest I had taken and the 24 km that I had covered.

My accommodation was dead easy to find: it was the first house in the village. The charming owner, Carmen, gave me a warm welcome and showed me to my room, which, to continue a theme started the day before, was called the Witches’ Room! There were books on white magic on the bedside table and old prints of tarot cards on the walls. I decided that this was something I had to look into, especially as Carmen told me she herself was a witch, according to her husband at least.

A quick web search revealed that Jabaloyas is known as the village of the witches in the Albarracín sierra. The local council’s website revealed that it is even possible to sponsor a witch to keep the tradition alive. From what I could gather from the website, pagan traditions are very much alive in this area. Perhaps that explains why the village church was surrounded with thick walls like ramparts.

In any case, when it came to dinner, Carmen worked real magic. She had written to tell me that there were no restaurants in the village, but that she could do me a “small” gastronomic menu for €27. She clearly didn’t have the same definition of small as me, as the menu was made up of four delicious, and inventive starters, an amazingly tasty main course and a local dessert, before Carmen brought out two types of pacharan similar to the one I had tasted at my evening in the refuge (one with sloes, the other with rosehips) and told me to have as much as I wanted. Seemingly convinced that I spoke Spanish, she talked to me throughout the meal as her husband occasionally drifted through the room in blue overalls, looking as if he had just stepped out of a mechanic’s workshop. From what I understood, she talked to me about crazy trail runners, the importance of locally produced food, the current world situation (Putin wouldn’t bother bombing Jabaloyas), how mad it made her to see migrants blamed for Spain’s economic problems, the distillation of hard liquor for personal consumption, and countless other subjects. If my Spanish doesn’t improve after this trip, there’s no hope for me!

After all that, and the day’s efforts, I was ready for bed. Despite the huge amount of food consumed, I fell asleep straight away and slept nine hours straight.