Valdemeca

Mountains of red sandstone and mushrooms

Valdemeca lies in the heart of Serranía Alta (upper Serranía), within the Natural Park. Its range is rodeno, red sandstone, and especially rich in mushrooms: Scots-pine woods, maritime-pine woods, meadows and clearings give each species its place. The centre retains cobbled streets, stone houses, Plaza del Coso and the Asunción church.

In 2007 the regional government’s Environment magazine presented Valdemeca as an exception within the Natural Park: it had regulated mushroom gathering to bring income to the Town Council.

What trades and memory tell

Eighteen painted-steel figures by Luis Zafrilla stand around the village and its surroundings: shepherds, washerwomen, musicians and other everyday scenes. This is the Paisaje Ilustrado. The La Puentecilla Ethnographic Museum preserves objects from that same life. In 2001 the Esparvel association began restoring the province’s fountains here.

Around Valdemeca

• Visitor Reception Centre, devoted to the Park’s mushrooms.
• Centenar viewpoint, above the valley and mountains.

Routes

The PNSC-S8, Fuente de la Ardilla-Estepares, is a 4 km walk to learn to observe mushrooms. It leaves Fuente de la Ardilla picnic area, just over 3 km along the Huerta del Marquesado track.

The PR-CU 105 (short-distance trail), Sendero de la Casa del Cura, is 16.5 km with a steep climb. It follows a bridle path to the Casa del Cura meadow, where migrating livestock stopped, passes an abandoned rento, an isolated farmstead in the hills, with its oven, now a shelter, and old lime kilns, and returns via the Cordilleras cliffs and Centenar viewpoint. A detour reaches the Chorrera del Gollizno, best after rain.

Along the Casa del Cura path, guide Fernando Carreras points out old livestock shelters and lime kilns, recognisable by their stone circles, and the change from black pine to Scots pine on the climb. In the Cura valley, ruined houses remain beside meadows where migrating livestock spent summer, and a restored oven. Many springs rise through the valley and Huerta de los Descalzos, several repaired in recent years, and in wet periods the Chorrera del Gollizno can be heard breaking through a limestone barrier. On the return, from the Centenar viewpoint, the reddish Sierra Colorá is visible opposite. The names Cura and Descalzos do not prove that a priest or convent was there.

A children’s game using the flowers of a wild plant to make noise was recorded in Valdemeca; ethnographer Eduardo Bollo of Vestal Etnografía cited it from Etnobotánica en la Serranía de Cuenca when discussing games made from what the countryside provided: juniper or box skittles, balls of common juniper or elm, and spinning tops called chompos in Cuenca.

Plan your visit

The village, centre and Paisaje Ilustrado fit into a morning. Autumn is mushroom season. PR-CU 105 needs a day.

Before you travel

Confirm the visitor centre’s opening calendar with the regional government. On PNSC-S8, look at mushrooms without picking them: this is a regulated gathering area and collecting requires a town council permit.

Combine with

Laguna del Marquesado, Huélamo, Beamud and Huerta del Marquesado are about 8 km away in a straight line.