A place called Monastery

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delicious rusticity

Sometimes, letting yourself be carried away by intuition and voluntarily getting lost along unknown paths and little or no traffic, has as a reward the opening of unexpected places, which, far from the characteristic demands of a well-to-do tourism, lover of luxury and exoticism, provide similar experiences. to the old pioneering adventures.

ancient popular architecture

Feeling, in some way, a pioneer in a strange land, populated by mountains, ravines, ancient oak forests, earthy plains and infinite moors that are lost on the horizon and where, fortunately, 5G technology has not yet arrived, entails, at least, in the spirit of the curious traveller, a whole lucid world of sensations.

Old Castilian manor houses

Sensations, which begin a few kilometers earlier, in towns known as Las Cuevas de Soria, Izana or the most stately Quintana Redonda, with its highly modified and unrecognizable Romanesque church, where the old sculptures on its capitals have been replaced by modern versions of San Roque and his eternal companion, the dog or the long-suffering Saint Michael, acting as Osiris in the Judgment of Souls of his balance, where artists always used to represent a tricky demon, doing everything impossible to unbalance the balance and his roadside posters , signaling the Cidian route towards Berlanga de Duero or the route of curiosity, towards places never heard of before, like this town, named Monasterio, to which I am inviting you to accompany me.

Urban dreams: stone, wood and tile

Located, then, in the middle of nowhere or in the middle of all those parts that in any case remain far enough away as not to share its tourist prominence, Monasterio is a place where silences are only broken by the distant rattle of the collars of the sheep, which peacefully graze some grasses where, fortunately, Attila's famous horse did not pass millennia ago or by the unexpected crash of thunder, a prelude to sudden storms, which, especially in summer, seem to converge in an area where those currents of hot and cold air converge, which like two ill-matched lovers, in the end they end upmeeting.

Following the old traditions

The vision of the town, however, is still subtly charming, if by that we understand the picturesqueness of a rural architecture, rough but eminently practical, which imitates, far from the semicircular arch of the Romans, that totus revolutum (all scrambled) of Celtiberian homes and where characteristic elements of other rural architectures are combined, albeit from the mountains and pine lands, where the characteristic pointed chimneys reappear, with all the force of ancient superstitions, which not only expelled bad moods from the home but also prevented the fateful witches - not only Macbeth knew them - penetrate decent homes, under penalty of being painfully nailed.

Unpaved natural streets

Foresighted, too, it is not difficult to find a good supply of that raw material, bloody like the clayey soil itself and so ungrateful for the long-suffering peasant to thresh, which are the tiles, which together with the firewood accumulated next to the fireplaces, they are enough indication for the traveler to imagine the harshness of some bleak winters, where isolation from the rest of the towns is practically guaranteed.

eternal solitudes

The Monastery also has a beautiful church, on whose floor we can appreciate the traces of that art, Romanesque and rural, which shines not because of the typical excess of metaphorical sculptures standing out on its corbels and capitals or because of the beauty of the porticoed gallery, which it lacks, but because of that air of humility that softens the heart, making those who contemplate it think that perhaps, after all, it is true that faith moves mountains.

country romanesque

Not far from the church, whose bells remain blissfully silent, so that it is not necessary to quote the poet Donne and ask for whom they toll, circulate, as used to be done in the old days with those metaphorical barracks of messenger birds, the dovecotes, the laundry Municipality once again reminds us of the long-suffering laundry methods of yesteryear and perhaps, seeing the cloudy water in the sink, who knows if it does not also bring back memories of the hands of our own grandmothers and mothers, of fingers disfigured by the harshness of the cold and repeated castings of yesteryear.

Past and present

In short: a town lost in the middle of nowhere on the immense moors of Soria, where you can enjoy yourself simply for the pleasure of letting yourself be carried away by an infinite succession of sensations, which make the trip once again have a sense of novelty.

'Forbidden to pick up stones'

NOTICE: Both the text and the accompanying photographs are my exclusive intellectual property and therefore are subject to my Copyright.

municipal laundry

Other photographs:

Firewood for harsh winters

replacement tiles

Old pastoral shelters

Lonely farmland roads

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