Fontilles (just off the CV715 inland from Orba)

This village was originally founded in 1901 as a leper hospital receiving it’s 1st 6 patients in 1909 and is now the only remaining one in Spain. The patients were originally attended by the Sisters of the Franciscanas de la Inmaculada who still tend patients to this day.

Since the inhabitants were shunned by society inside the stone walls the hospital had to become a community in it’s own right with it’s own bakery, carpenter, shoe-maker, theatre, etc and so Fontilles was born.

The population dwindled down to only 60 people however it has recently been given a new lease of life with the building of a retirement home there.