Madrigalejo Railway Station (Ruins)

The main building has an area of about 300 m2 and a capacity for 150 passengers. Inside, there are pieces of the posters that indicated the destinations and schedules of the trains that never ran. You can also see the tracks that extend to the north and south, but end abruptly in the middle of the field.
It is a two-story building with a brick facade and a clock tower. Some original elements were preserved inside, such as the counters, benches and lockers.
The station is surrounded by a park with trees, benches and fountains, where neighbors often stroll and celebrate some parties. One of them is the Thursday of Comadres, which is celebrated on the Thursday before the carnival. On that day, the town’s young people tie empty cans to their bicycles and make noise in the streets. Then they go on a pilgrimage to the station, where they eat, drink and dance to the music.
It was a narrow-gauge line, with a gauge of 750 mm, which would run some 146 km through the provinces of Toledo, Cáceres and Badajoz. However, the project was affected by numerous technical, economic and political problems. The Civil War, the post-war period and the dictatorship delayed the works and reduced the budgets. In addition, the emergence of road transport made railroads less interesting and less profitable. Finally, in 1962, it was decided to abandon the project, leaving an unfinished and ghostly work.
The road is in recovery. For this purpose, El Camino Natural de Las Villuercas has been designed, which is a route linking the regions of Vegas del Guadiana and La Jara, crossing landscapes of great beauty and ecological value. The road takes advantage of this route of the old railroad from Talavera de la Reina to Villanueva de la Serena, which was never completed1 . The road has a length of almost 70 km and is divided into six stages1 . One of them passes through Madrigalejo, where you can visit the Bird Observatory and the Interpretation Center of the Catholic Monarchs among other places of interest. The trail runs parallel to the Ruecas River and the Sierra Brava reservoir, where numerous species of waterfowl can be observed. It is signposted and can be explored on foot, by bicycle or on horseback.