We decided to separate the Barcelona blog into two parts, because the second half will be from our trip to the Montserrat monastery.
I kept on asking Chantelle where she had found out about this place, and she kept on saying "I don't know, Pinterest?" Like a few of the places we had planned to visit, I literally had zero idea what to expect. Here is what I learned about Montserrat from the day that we spent exploring the beautiful mountain monastery.
I learned that this place is super old. Apparently people have lived on this mountain as monks, or hermits for hundreds of years. Second, I also learned that there was a Spanish king who spent his last days here and died on the mountain. Lastly, there was so much that we didn't have time to see, which is always never fun.
The day was quite eventful. We were told by Google Maps to take a certain bus to get there. We took it, and were dropped off in the middle of this tiny town and no direction to get up the mountain. It took a couple conversations of broken English to realize that we were right beside a special train station that only went up and down the mountain (the station conveniently hidden across a bridge, behind a bunch of houses on a hill). From the very start, this was a magical place and I can see why people revere these mountains as sacred and spiritual. The world seems to slip away as you climb higher and higher. Once you reach the top, all you can hear is the wind, and see an incredible distance in every direction. There is an old cathedral that anchors the little village in the mountain with beautiful sculptures and treasures. After exploring through the old church we took 1 of 2 trams to the very top of the mountain where multiple old chapels are found scattered throughout the mountain range. There are pathways literally carved into the side of the mountain which we thought were really cool. I also have this weird obsession with stairs that are carved into existing geography, and this place had so many random stairways carved into the mountain, leading who-knows where.
After spending a few days in the busy rush of Barcelona, it was an amazing trip to Monsterrat. We felt like we could have spent days exploring all of the different chapels and walks dedicated to different saints and priests. We will have to go back one day!
