Spain's 'Hobbit village': The Middle Earth of the western Mediterranean

FANTASY film and series fans have been known to travel to the opposite end of the wrong hemisphere to tour the sets of their favourite screen productions – which makes Spain their perfect destination, wherever they're based on Planet Earth. 

From the 1980s' kids' classic, The Neverending Story, one of a long string of features that used Almería province's Mónsul beach for scenes, to the Ducal mansions in the grounds of Cantabria's very own Parthenon where Nicole Kidman was filmed in The Others, to the numerous sites used in the cult series Game of Thrones, plenty of far-too-little-known enclaves in Spain are a cinema buff's paradise.

Not just supernatural, sci-fi or historical fairytale productions, either: Spaghetti westerns, through which a whole generation built up a mental picture of US cowboy country, were actually shot in Almería's Tabernas desert – guided tours of the sets are immensely popular – and British expats on the east coast tended to enjoy the UK slapstick comedy television series Benidorm more than their counterparts in the 'old country', since they recognised the parts of the holiday town of the same name used for filming.

Tolkien's modern-day readers, or those who have given the legendary sci-fi novelist's hefty tomes a swerve and opted to watch the similarly-lengthy screen versions of them instead, have taken trips to New Zealand with the sole objective of touring the Hobbiton, the purpose-built village in Matamata which became Middle Earth for six blockbusters over 13 years.

Even though the nation home to the world's southernmost capital city has infinite other beautiful, natural and man-made, attractions, the standard two-hour guided tour of the Shire and the miniature village where Gandalf, Bilbo and Frodo ate and slept in between world-saving adventures is still New Zealand's biggest hook for many.

Only, if you live north of the equator, the flight is expensive and arduous, the round trip alone taking up a full four to five days of your life before you've even seen any of the country.

Luckily, there's a Hobbit village in Spain you can visit instead.

Holidaying in Hobbitland: 'Bag's End' cottages you can sleep in

In the exact Antipodes of the original Hobbiton country, Mi Tesoro – which translates as 'My Treasure' – not only recreates the abodes of Orlando Bloom's, Elijah Woods' and Martin Freeman's characters, but you can actually live in them yourself.

The complex used for the Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit films in New Zealand is visitable from the outside, but if you entered one of the little burrows lodged into the grassy hillocks, you would find them completely empty – the indoor scenes were shot in a studio in Wellington.

But the Hobbit houses in Spain's far north-western region of Galicia are fully furnished, with all the bed-sheets, wine glasses, cutlery, flat-screen TVs, sofas, computer desks and coffee tables you'd need for a short-term stay – or a long-term one, since special packages are offered for 'digital nomads' or home-workers who want to spend some time surrounded by countryside, peace and quiet.

And even though Frodo, Bilbo et al probably didn't spend much of their hectic, action-packed lives sitting around in Bag's End cottage checking their emails or updating their Facebook status, the Galicia Hobbit houses include free high-speed WiFi for everyone who books a trip.

Pets are welcome, too, for an additional fee.

Hobbiton-on-Sea

'Hobbit village' isn't its official title. To be able to use a trademark of this magnitude would mean legal agreements, royalties, licence fees and other expensive red tape; rather like the situation faced by the Málaga-province town of Júzcar, formerly known as the 'Smurf Village'. 

But in the same way as the latter is not prevented from having every single one of its buildings painted in psychedelic blue, there's no law against designing your tourist chalets as squat, grass-covered cave houses that just happen to look like the Baggins' residence in the Shire, as long as you've got planning permission.

And, in fact, when Virginia Mateos decided to up sticks from Madrid and move to the rural part of Lugo province's coast where she had spent every summer as a child, she and her husband were rather thinking of fishing boats than the Fellowship of the Ring.

The couple fell in love with the plot because it was completely natural, green and unspoilt with trees growing wild and no obvious incursion by modern service infrastructure, such as overhead cables or pylons – coincidentally, exactly what attracted the film series' director Peter Jackson to the Alexander farm in Matamata on the opposite side of the world, which would become the Hobbiton.

To keep it that way, they would need to design their future holiday village so as to complement the scenery, and decided on just three self-contained villas, each with their own picnic table where a full and healthy breakfast would be served outside, weather permitting.

When dreaming up a structure for a villa that blends into its rural background, Virginia and her husband took the definition literally: They built huts physically entrenched into said background. Dug-outs in the lawn-covered hillocks, with just the front part protruding, as though the field had opened its eyes and the little houses were the iris and pupils.

Hobbit huts, therefore, fit the bill, although the round windows were designed to match those on the seafaring craft which local fishermen off Lugo's northern coast would spend weeks living on board at a time.

They were then painted, each in a different colour, in the style of fishing boats, and given names that reflect the maritime culture of the area.

The red one is called Cueva de la Sirena ('Mermaid's Cave'), the yellow hut is Estrella de los Mares ('Star of the Seas' – although an estrella de mar is, in fact, a starfish), and the blue villa is the Faro Norte ('North Lighthouse').

“For many people, they evoke images of gnomes' or Smurfs' houses, although many more think of them as being Hobbit homes,” Virginia explains.

As for the name, this was practically the first decision taken after buying the land – it's a tribute to the treasured childhood summer holiday memories that brought Virginia pinging back to the Viveiro area of Lugo like a giant, invisible elastic band.

What else to do in the Viveiro area

Rural tourism – with or without a beach nearby (and Mi Tesoro does have one almost on the doorstep) – has been en vogue in Spain since the first Covid lockdown eased, as staycations became the only practical, headache-free form of holidays that summer, the desire to 'get away', as though leaving one's everyday environment for a spell also meant leaving the pandemic behind, the compelling need for a sensation of relaxation, and an anxious desire to avoid crowds all pushed Spanish residents deep into the countryside.

But for 'eco-tourism' virgins, this crowd-anxiety was replaced by another type: Once you get to your destination, what are you actually supposed to do? It's all very well having clean air and pretty scenery outside your hotel, villa or apartment, but you can't spend a week or two just breathing and looking.

Fortunately, any accommodation or travel organiser specialising in rural holidays will have this covered – information leaflets in reception, arranged day trips either included in the price or optional for an extra fee, maps and guide books will be available, meaning you can make enquiries there ahead of your trip or, even, simply turn up and ask what to do and how to do it when you get there.

As for Mi Tesoro, it's based in Viveiro, one of a long list of hotspots for exploring Galicia's famous Rías, or river deltas. The holiday village itself organises regular motorboat tours of the Viveiro delta, a full day's coastal safari costing, at the time of publication, €75 a head.

A complex network of countryside cycle paths, and the beach just a few minutes away on two wheels, mean the Viveiro area is perfect for getting on your bike and the owners can give you complete itinerary details so you don't have to worry about getting lost.

Plus, it's almost not worth taking your own bicycle with you. Mi Tesoro can hire one out to you for €10 a day, meaning you don't have to lug yours about.

If you're an experienced rider, you'll know that the best view of any countryside is, unquestionably, that seen between a horse's ears, and that the most beautiful rural scenery is that which rushes past at a rate of 25 kilometres per hour to the sound of hoof-falls on tempting, soft and open grass. Also, unless you're a horse or other ruminant yourself, you would only ever find yourself describing open grassland as 'tempting' if you were either a golfer or a horsey person.

And if you've never so much as sat on a seaside donkey or carousel horse before, you've missed out on one of the most sublimely beautiful and emotional experiences available to the human race: Taking part in a sport which can be either thrilling or relaxing, and sharing every moment of it with an affectionate and trusting animal.

Mi Tesoro has a stable yard with four horses of its own, of varying heights and suitable for any ability – reliable and steady enough for beginners, but able to satisfy the greater needs of those who can barely remember life before it involved being bodily welded to a saddle.

A quiet hack for the less-experienced costs €30, or a full trek up to the Montecastelo viewing point, complete with sunset, comes in at €60.

If the idea of booking a room in a Hobbit house for the night appeals, you might also be intrigued by the thought of staying in a bubble, cube, castle, monastery or tree-house – click on the link to the left to find out about some of Spain's other wonderfully weird hotels.