Our third port call was at Barcelona, a city which I have visited and enjoyed before. This visit showed that Barcelona isn't always the sunny spectacle which online photos would have you believe. I tried going out on deck for a while after breakfast, and I got one brief sunny break between showers -- but it was still windy and chilly. Definitely not "Sunny Catalonia!"
During one brief moment in the morning when there was a bit of sun before the rain, I stepped out on deck and took these two pictures. Check out all the lined-up taxis and tour coaches outside our terminal -- and then multiply that by five times for the five cruise ships in harbour in Barcelona that day.
The unfavourable state of weather continued until about 2:30 in the afternoon. By that time, many passengers had given up and were slogging back onboard, wet, chilled, and unhappy. And this is where I got my lucky break. My tour was leaving at 3:15 pm, and in fact actually left about 5 minutes early because all 17 passengers on a full-size tour coach had already joined the party. Nice -- the least crowded tour I think I've ever been on in my entire cruise career. But we didn't stop in Barcelona. We drove right through the city and out into the Catalan countryside on one of the main highways.
This was our destination:
Photo by Josep Relalias -- own work.
This extraordinary jagged mountain (mountain range is perhaps more accurate) is called Montserrat -- the Catalan name comes very close to the English translation of "serrated mountain." The highest peak of the range stands 1,236 metres (4,055 feet). Yes, there are taller mountains in many places. But since Montserrat rises with almost no preliminary ascent straight up out of the Catalonian coastal plains, the relative height as you approach it seems much greater.
I wasn't at all surprised when we had arrived in one of the deep canyons, and our guide told us that this place, this mountain, had been a site of sacred activity time out of mind. It's a powerful, dramatic landscape. The power seemed to me to manifest in an an irresistible urge to look up, to direct your eyes towards the sky where so many religions have placed the abode of divine power. You don't even have to be especially religious to want to follow the classic phrase from Psalm 121, "I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills." Montserrat will likely find you doing just that. It certainly had that impact on me, the instant I stepped off our coach.
Our actual destination was a monastery, built onto a sizable ledge of rock between two of the higher peaks. The Benedictine Monastery and Sanctuary of Santa Maria has existed here in one form or another at least since the 1200s (confirmed by an official survey) and is reputed by tradition to have been around since the 800s. Due to the frequent and surging tides of warfare in this region so close to the Pyrenees, the monastic buildings have been destroyed and rebuilt on multiple occasions. What you see today is almost entirely constructed in the 20th century. It's still an active monastery.
In addition to the monastery proper, there is a music school, an assortment of shops and restaurants, and three mountain railways: one rising to the crest of the peak on the left in the last picture, one dropping down a short way to a chapel in a deep valley, and the third -- the newest -- going all the way to the base of the mountain to make for easier access. That newest railway is the ideal access to Montserrat for anyone nervous about driving or being driven on narrow, twisting mountain roads.
Different places along the road and walkway from the parking areas to the monastery proper offer some spectacular views looking down from the mountain as well.
Our visit included a tour of the monastery itself. We were first taken into the courtyard which faces the main facade of the church.
Before entering the church proper, we went up a narrow winding staircase to view the pilgrimage shrine, housing the Virgin of Montserrat, an old carving in wood of the Virgin and Child. Based on the style and features, the statue is believed to date from the early medieval period, before the year 1000. The faces and hands are believed to have become discoloured and blackened over the centuries by chemical reactions to paint or by smoke, and have been covered over or touched up on several occasions with black paint. Many Catholics, and even Catalans who are not conventionally religious, venerate the Virgin of Montserrat's miraculous interventions. She is the patron saint of the Montserrat monastery, together with Sant Jordi (Saint George), and Catalans refer to her affectionately as La Moreneta ("the Little Dark One").
In front of her is a glass window facing out over the nave of the abbey church.
In this interior view from the rear of the church, you can see the window with the Virgin of Montserrat in the background, high above and behind the main altar of the church.
We also attended a brief audio-visual show about the nature of the monastery, the life of the monks, the choir school, and other aspects of this community.
There's a strong legendary link between Montserrat and the tradition of the Holy Grail, a relationship emphasized in Richard Wagner's final and most mystical opera, Parsifal. Wagner even designed the sets for his hall of the Holy Grail Castle based on the design of the Montserrat church.
I would have loved to ride the funicular up to the high ridge above the monastery and back, but it's rather slow and runs only three times an hour, and I was afraid I wouldn't have enough time before I would need to be back at the bus. However, here's an internet photo which shows the entire complex viewed from the upper end of the funicular line.
By Richard Schneider - aufgenommen, fotografiert von Richard Schneider, CC BY-SA 3.0, httpscommons.wikimedia.orgwindex.phpcurid=587310
Our start time for the drive back to the Barcelona cruise port was 7:00 pm, and it could have taken quite a while if the traffic had been bad. It wasn't. We whipped right through the city and down to the cruise port with no delays at all, and arrived beside the ship in 59 minutes. That meant we were actually early enough for me to do a quick change and have a proper dinner in the restaurant, as usual!
The monastery of Santa Maria de Montserrat is a truly remarkable institution in a truly remarkable place. I'm very glad I took the opportunity to go there and see both the mountains and the shrine for myself.
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