The Serranía de Cuenca without your own car: Ciudad Encantada, Uña, Tragacete and the source of the river Cuervo with a driver from Cuenca and from the Fernando Zóbel AVE

What is the Serranía de Cuenca Natural Park and what is there to see?

The Serranía de Cuenca Natural Park was declared by Castilla-La Mancha's Law 5/2007 and protects more than seventy thousand hectares of mountain across a dozen municipalities north and east of the capital, Uña, Tragacete, Las Majadas and Villalba de la Sierra among them. It is a country of black and Scots pine forest, of gorges that the Júcar, the Escabas and the Cuervo have cut into the limestone, and of karst formations the water has carved over millions of years: the Ciudad Encantada at Valdecabras, the Callejones of Las Majadas or the Palancares sinkholes. The regional government manages it with a resource plan and a network of signposted trails, and the night sky of the area holds the Starlight certification that vouches for its darkness.

What almost everyone wants to see fits into one long day and follows the Júcar upstream. The Ventano del Diablo is a natural balcony over the river gorge, right beside the road, seen with a brief stop. The Ciudad Encantada has its own ticketed trail. Uña, the smallest village in the province, looks onto a green lagoon ringed by rock walls where vultures nest. Las Majadas keeps the Callejones, a maze of rocks explored on foot. Tragacete is the big village of the upper Serranía, with lodgings and restaurants, and a few kilometres on is the source of the river Cuervo, a Natural Monument, where the water falls in curtains over the tufa and, in deep winter, freezes into icicles.

How do you get up to the Serranía from Cuenca and from Fernando Zóbel?

Everything hangs off one road, the CM-2105, which leaves Cuenca northwards following the Júcar, passes Villalba de la Sierra and the Ventano del Diablo and climbs the gorge to Uña, Huélamo and Tragacete, ending at the Vega del Codorno and the source of the Cuervo. Off it branch the Valdecabras road to the Ciudad Encantada, which rejoins the main road near Uña, and the spur up to Las Majadas. These are mountain roads, narrow and winding, where a driver who knows them makes the difference between a calm day and a tense one at the wheel; Tragacete is well over an hour from the capital, and the source of the Cuervo lies beyond it.

Anyone arriving by AVE comes into Cuenca-Fernando Zóbel, south-west of the city beside the A-40 and on the opposite side from the Serranía, so the tour begins by crossing Cuenca. The driver collects at the station with the train number, climbs the CM-2105 and returns the traveller to the station or the hotel at the end of the day. From the province's towns the Serranía is a long trip combined with the capital: from Tarancón to Cuenca it is 84 km along the A-40, from Motilla del Palancar 70 km along the N-320, and then up; the Ciudad Encantada is 146 km from Mota del Cuervo and 124 km from Quintanar del Rey.

What public transport is there in the Serranía and why is it no use for visiting?

It exists, but it is designed for residents, not for people going to look at the landscape. The intercity lines the regional government contracts for the Serranía link Tragacete, Uña, Las Majadas and the other villages with Cuenca on weekdays, with very few departures, going down to the city in the morning and back up in the afternoon: exactly the opposite of what a visitor needs when they want to go up first thing and come down at sunset. At weekends and on holidays, when most people want to go, the service shrinks or does not run. No line reaches the Ciudad Encantada, the Callejones of Las Majadas or the source of the river Cuervo, which are several kilometres from any village.

Nor is there any way to sort out the return on the spot. Uña and Tragacete have no taxi rank, mobile coverage fails at the bottom of the gorge and in the car park at the source of the Cuervo, and a car coming up from Cuenca to fetch someone takes as long as it takes. That is why the province page's rule for the Serranía season, go with the return booked, is more than advice here: the whole tour is fixed before setting off, with the stops, the return time and the drop-off point in Cuenca or at the station, and the price is for the car and the tour, not per person.

How do you organise the day with a driver: waiting time or several stops?

There are two ways and both are booked as a single service. The first is the transfer with waiting time: the car takes you to one place, the driver waits for as long as the visit lasts and brings you back to the starting point. It suits the Ciudad Encantada on its own, which takes an hour and a half to walk round, or a morning in Uña with the lagoon and the viewpoint. The second is the multi-stop tour, which is what almost everyone coming from outside asks for: Ventano del Diablo, Ciudad Encantada, Uña, lunch in Tragacete and the source of the river Cuervo in the afternoon, or the variant via Las Majadas and the Callejones. Each stop has its agreed time and the calculator gives the price of the whole tour before you confirm.

For groups the sums tip towards the car: a family of four or a group of friends pays one price per vehicle, and for six or more people a larger car or several cars coordinated on the same tour are assigned, as is done for events. Schools and associations organising outings to the Serranía usually ask for several vehicles at the same time with pickup in their home town. If the group comes from La Mancha or La Manchuela, the day starts earlier: from Horcajo de Santiago to Fernando Zóbel it is 106 km, and from Huete the Ciudad Encantada is 79 km and about 84 min.

What changes with the season: spring to autumn, long weekends and snow?

The Serranía season runs from spring to autumn and concentrates on long weekends and weekends, when the Tragacete road fills with cars and the Ciudad Encantada car park runs out of room by midday. May and June are the months of high water on the Cuervo and a full Uña lagoon; July and August, of cool nights and the Starlight sky; October and November, of the colour of the riverside woods in the gorge. On those dates it is wise to book the tour days ahead, leave early to reach the Ciudad Encantada at opening time and keep the source of the Cuervo for the afternoon, once the coaches have gone down.

Winter is another Serranía. Early-morning frost is routine, the Valdecabras road and the climb to Tragacete can have ice or snow and the passes in the area require chains or winter tyres when the traffic authority says so; in return, the frozen source of the river Cuervo is one of the most sought-after sights in the province and the villages are empty. With a driver, the trip adapts to what the road report says that day: it is confirmed the evening before, departure is pushed back until the frost lifts or the order of the stops changes, and if the road is closed the service is cancelled at no cost. The Ciudad Encantada's opening hours change between winter and summer and are published by its operator.

Frequently asked questions

Sources

• Junta de Comunidades de Castilla-La Mancha · Áreas protegidas: Parque Natural de la Serranía de Cuenca y Monumento Natural del Nacimiento del Río Cuervo (consulted on 27 October 2026)
• Ciudad Encantada · horarios, entradas y acceso (consulted on 27 October 2026)
• Renfe · trenes con parada en Cuenca-Fernando Zóbel (consulted on 27 October 2026)
• DGT · estado de las carreteras y obligación de cadenas (consulted on 27 October 2026)