Peratallada is a beautiful, almost eerily well-preserved stone village in Spain. To me, it also felt very empty. Often, as I was walking (sometimes, tripping) over the lovely cobblestones, I’d be entirely alone. When I did pass other people, they would almost always be other tourists.
In addition to a medieval castle, bell tower, and a moat, Peratallada has 14 restaurants, and I’m guess about the same number of guest houses, most of them fairly small. There are a number of “tourist shops” with the usual assortment of clothes and crafts, a wine shop, and a ceramics shop. All of it was lovely – but it did feel different to be in a place so specific to catering to tourists, with the lives of the limited number of residents feeling very, very hidden. I think that Carly, the orchestrator of this trip, perhaps described it best when she said the town was kind of like a museum.
(A very nice museum with excellent food and wine.)
(Also, after visiting several places where this wasn’t the case, I couldn’t get over how healthy all of the cats were!)
Most people seem to come to Peratallada by car, and we arrived via a bus that runs from Girona once each day. However, there is also a hiking path between Peratallada and another nearby stone village, Vulpellac, which has more frequent bus service.
We first hiked to Vulpellac in an attempt to find a winery, which ended up being closed. However, the walk itself was still lovely; it takes about an hour each way, through fields and past a quarry.
The hike also passes through YET ANOTHER charming stone village, Canapost. The woman who managed our hotel told us not to miss the medieval cemetery behind the church. I’m glad we didn’t!
Past this village, there were several pig compounds. This makes sense seeing as pig parts of various sorts seem to be the most popular menu items in Spain. We didn’t actually see any pigs, but could definitely smell and hear them from inside the buildings.
Because of the limited amount of direct bus service, I decided to hike out of town the morning of my departure. It felt charming to be transporting myself from one village to another village on foot, similar to how people must have done for hundreds of years. (Well, kind of similar. The villages are well-preserved, but luckily the homicide rates of the medieval ages are not.)