Villalba de la Sierra

The entrance to the Serranía along the Júcar

Villalba de la Sierra stands beside the Júcar and is one of the entrances to the Natural Park. Its centre, of low houses, has a church retaining a Romanesque bell gable and apse; its dedication is unclear: some sources give the Natividad, others San Bartolomé.

Downstream, the Júcar has cut a deep gorge. The Ventano del Diablo overlooks it, and there are further viewpoints on the ridges and one beside the village in Calle Cueva del Romeral.

What trades and memory tell

In 1926 the station known locally as the Salto entered service. Júcar water arrived by canal from La Toba reservoir, through Laguna de Uña, and the electricity went to Madrid. A settlement with a church, school and company shop was built below. Much of the village worked there for decades, reflected in the census: Villalba grew from 726 inhabitants in 1920 to 1,140 in 1940. Those who lived in the settlement tell the story in The Salto de Villalba.

Wool, fulling mill and waterwheel

Villalba separated from Cuenca in 1510 and lived from livestock: in the Ensenada Cadastre, in the mid-18th century, this was its main wealth. About two hundred paces from the village, beside the Júcar, a wool-washing works had operated since the 17th century, with a shearing house, enclosures, a drying meadow and a cauldron. A channel of about forty metres took water to a tank, the cacerón, then to the cauldron and tinos, stone tanks where the capitán de tinos decided water and temperature for each batch of wool. More than four thousand arrobas passed through the vats annually. In 1734 its owner placed it in her entailed estate along with twelve thousand sheep; it later passed to the Viscounts of Huerta. Today a hotel stands on the washery and old mill site.

Beside the flour mill was also a fulling mill for thickening cloth, mentioned by Madoz in the mid-19th century. After the war a waterwheel was installed over the mill channel to irrigate the valley fields; the first was wooden, and the present galvanised-iron one, four metres in diameter, dates from 1996. Each morning the goatherd took the village goats from the council pen, and at dusk they returned home by themselves; the village’s last sheep flock, 220 head, was sold in 1998.

La Vereda

The Cañada Real de Rodrigo Ardaz (royal drove road), locally called La Vereda, passes through Villalba. It begins in Guadalajara, crosses the Tagus by the bridge bearing its name at Peralejos de las Truchas, and descends through Cueva del Hierro, Masegosa, Vega del Codorno, Las Majadas and Portilla to Villalba, then through Sotos, Mariana and Chillarón, where many flocks boarded trains when seasonal livestock journeys began using wagons; previously they continued on foot to Sierra Morena. Flocks from the high mountains reached Villalba on the third or fourth day. They rested at midday beside the Fuente del Cubillo drinking trough, next to a building called «los albergues» (the shelters), now the Refugio de la Vereda, restored through a European project. Shepherds from Masegosa, Lagunaseca or Vega del Codorno went south in November and returned in May; at night they used the Cabrillas (the Pleiades) to know when the watch changed.

The drove road is ninety Castilian varas wide, converted by one source to about 75 metres and another to 72.22; boundary stones remain at its sides, and in pine woods it appears as a cleared strip easily mistaken for a firebreak. In 2022, according to guide Fernando Carreras, Cuenca’s migrating flocks still passed along it at least twice a year. Rockrose and rosemary grow at its edges, which he attributes to seeds brought in sheep’s wool from warmer lands. Nearby is a small pond used for watering livestock. The Cañada Real de la Cerraja also crosses the municipality’s woodland, and at Tres Mojones the boundaries of Villalba, Mariana and Zarzuela meet.

Villacampa in Villalba

In April 1812, during the Peninsular War, Cuenca’s French garrison caught up at Villalba with General Villacampa, covering the movement of five hundred French prisoners towards Alicante. Villacampa withdrew in good order, and the French returned to Cuenca without freeing them: the prisoners were travelling by another road.

On 9 May 2025 the Casa de la Cultura hosted the first ItineraSTEAM schools fair, directed by Raquel Fernández Cézar: around three hundred mountain schoolchildren, including those from Carboneras secondary school, presented work on the science of rural trades and techniques.

In 2021 Villalba’s shepherds’ shelter had a roof in poor condition and broken beams. The LIFE Cañadas project planned to remove the tiles by hand for reuse, replace the structure and install bunks.

Around Villalba de la Sierra

• Salto de Villalba, the 1926 power station and its settlement.
• Villalba viewpoints: seven vantage points on the ridge above the Júcar, from Peña del Águila to the Salto.
• Piedra Yunque, at 1,369 m, on PR-CU 33 (short-distance trail).

Routes

The PR-CU 33, Ruta de la Piedra Yunque, leaves along Camino de las Aguas, follows the Santa María ravine upstream to Fuente de la Losilla and climbs through pine woods to Piedra Yunque at 1,369 m. It is 17 km long with 720 m of elevation gain.

Plan your visit

The centre and viewpoints fit into a morning; PR-CU 33 needs another.

Before you travel

The viewpoints overlook cliffs: keep away from the edge. The Salto settlement belongs to the electricity company; ask the town hall whether visits are possible. The Júcar floods: do not go down into the riverbed.

Combine with

Zarzuela is 4.2 km away in a straight line and Portilla 6.1 km. To understand the canal, continue to Uña lake.