Ermita de Nuestra Señora de la Paz and Cerro de la Horca Viewpoint
Perched on the low ridge that separates Alcobendas from the open Castilian plateau to the north, the whitewashed Ermita de Nuestra Señora de la Paz is a 17th-century hermitage chapel that almost nobody outside the neighbourhood knows exists. The scrubby hilltop behind it — locally called the Cerro de la Horca — offers a 360-degree panorama that stretches from the Sierra de Guadarrama snowcaps all
The Hermitage and Its History
The ermita is a simple, single-nave chapel with thick lime-washed walls and a small bell tower that has watched the fields around it transform from olive groves into a metropolitan municipality over three centuries. It remains an active place of local devotion — on the feast day of Nuestra Señora de la Paz in late January, Alcobendas residents walk up in procession and the surrounding hillside fills with families eating merienda in the winter sun.
The interior is modest but genuinely moving: a painted wooden retablo, flickering votive candles and the kind of cool, incense-tinged silence that big city churches rarely manage. The chapel is usually open on Sunday mornings; at other times the exterior and the hilltop views are freely accessible.
The Viewpoint and How to Reach It
A rough footpath behind the ermita climbs the last 50 metres of the Cerro de la Horca in five minutes, emerging onto a flat, rocky summit scattered with wild rosemary and thyme. On a clear winter morning after rain has scrubbed the atmosphere clean, the Guadarrama peaks appear close enough to touch, their ridgelines still dusted with snow well into April.
To reach the ermita, head north from the Alcobendas town centre along Calle Real and follow signs for the Camino de la Ermita — a 25-minute walk from the Plaza Mayor. There is also a small parking area at the base of the hill for those arriving by car.
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