On the road (3) A (hopefully) sunny September road trip to Spain COMPLETED - Page 39 - PassPorter - A Community of Walt Disney World, Disneyland, Disney Cruise Line, and General Travel Forums
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Wednesday 15 September – part five: now that’s what I call a stodge fest...
When we came out, we saw a candle sign and found this wonderful display of candles. The heat from there was quite something.
I wanted to go into the bapistry to see the famous Virgin, but Mark wasn’t feeling so well, so I set off on my own. You enter through a door to the right and progress up various stairs. There was quite a line to see her, so we had a wait, allowing me to get some photos on the way.
The statue is a small wooden one of La Morenta (the dark one), which is the heart of Montserrat. It is said to have been made by St. Luke and then brought her by St. Peter in 50 AD. Centuries later, it was hidden away in a cave. Sadly, wonderful as this history sounds, carbon dating has apparently shown it’s more likely that it dates from the 12th century, which is a shame. She’s protected behind glass, but her wooden orb is available for pilgrims to touch, which I did.
The guy in front of me touching the orb... ... and the view back into the basilica below
I headed back down and came out into the candle area again.
On the way back out again
By now, our stomachs really were demanding food, so the next business was to find the restaurant here, which we did, getting a few more photos on the way.
We found it, but it was buried inside a property. I honestly thought it would have lovely views either of the villages below or the monastery and, if it had, I wouldn’t have minded paying the €20 ($26) they were charged for each entree! Without that scenery, I couldn’t see the point.
We carried on wandering and found ourselves back in the original square we’d started in.
We headed into the bar, where they had a nice menu up, but as soon as I asked for something off it, we were told in no uncertain terms that all they had now were baguettes – either Spanish omelettes, Spanish ham or ham and cheese. We both went for the Spanish omelette, which has potatoes in it and it was a bit of a stodge fest. Although I enjoyed it at the time, I know it repeated on both of us horribly later in the way.
Once we’d finished eating, it was time to head back down, as we’d spent a good couple of hours browsing the place. We found a shop and got a book, fridge magnet and picture of the place.
Then it was back down on the funicular railway. My goodness, there was a heck of a line for this and I must admit I did think that perhaps we wouldn’t get a seat, but these things take more people than you think and we were seated with no problem.
Once back at the car park, I used the restrooms and we took a few final photos.
Photos of the original railway that run up to Montserrat
I hope all the photos are showing through OK - at the moment, there's obviously an issue with Photobucket and none are showing up, so I can't check them.
All the photos are lovely. I found your comment about The Madonna to be true with most religious artifacts they aften are not what the legend tells us the 12th century is a far cry from 50AD.
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Wednesday 15 September – part six: you certainly know you’re leaving Spain!
Then it was back out on the road again. We headed first for Barcelona, where the traffic did get a little hairy and pretty busy in places. As it was a time when most businesses were supposed to be working, that was a bit of a nasty surprise.
Finally, we were through that and heading for Girona and the French border. My goodness, we knew that we were heading for France. Whereas, on the way down here, the French had just signposted San Sebastian, which happens to be in Spain, with no mention of the country, here it was everywhere, with signs counting down the kilometres and minutes until you reached the next country, as well as signs marking the last turning and service station before you left Spain.
Very odd to see names of French towns and cities in Spanish
We took advantage of that last service station to fill up with gas, as it’s a lot cheaper in Spain than it is in France.
Then we were crossing the border, and bizarrely, this is an actual border crossing, the first one we’ve seen in the EU in all our road trips. By the way, if you’re thinking that Switzerland had border crossings, they did, but they’re not part of the EU, so that’s different. They even had police there, so I managed to sneak a photo, once we were safely across.
And now those French towns and cities written in French
Again, like the journey down, almost as soon as we crossed the border, the scenery changed, with the Pyrenees range of mountain looming up through the sunset to the left of us. It was a beautiful view.
The scenery generally became a lot more green and lush as well. Our first stop in France was to be Perpignan, which I wanted to see. The aim was to get to the main town square, as I’d read it had a couple of impressive buildings, but that wasn’t going to happen, as they seemed to have pedestrianised the area since we got Tim. However, the parts of the town we saw were wonderful, with some beautiful buildings along the river bank.
We did also encounter French driving at its worst. After realising that we couldn’t go down the road we wanted, we were left in no-man’s land in a bus lane, with a French female driver refusing to let us in. She was even moaning about us. Thanks for the understanding for a foreign driver – and here’s a photo of the miserable woman. Judging by the state of her car, I suspect she’s a bit of an aggressive motorist.
All caught up!
I never thought of it, but I guess that many candles would give off a fair amount of heat!!
Great pictures, of course, Cheryl... and I know what you mean about the inconsiderate driver, I had to deal with one of those yesterday!!
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Without that scenery, I couldn’t see the point. 
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Claytrgtshooter (Minnie Lor's Hubbie)
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