El Tranquilo

If walking or cycling's your thing, the off-road trails in the immediate area will take you along roads, up forested hillsides and past old farmhouses; for photographers and artists, this is a pretty excellent spot. Lots of little villages are within easy reach of El Tranquilo too, such as upmarket Las Encebras, with its own local bar restaurant, Alguena and its lively café-bar and restaurant scene and Sunday market, plus Paredon and Raspay. For more food and markets, Pinoso (under 10 minutes' drive away) has over 70 restaurants and bars as well as greengrocers, bakeries, butchers, fishmongers and a Saturday market. For wildlife watching, the Sierra del Carche Regional Park, included in the Natura 2000 Network, is home to bats, hedgehogs, rabbits, shrews and the occasional wild cat, badger and pine marten. Also of interest in the park are several archaeological sites, from well-preserved Bronze Age Iberian settlements – including the Cave of the Castellar, the Castillicos del Salero and the Romanía – to a Roman aqueduct in La Romanía and several Roman settlements in the north and the west.