One of the things I really wanted to do on this trip was hear the famous boys choir at Montserrat. They do not sing each day in the church and when they do its only for about 5 – 10 minutes. We made our way into the packed church just as they started singing, the church was packed with hundreds of people. The choir was beautiful!
Tony has taken some 360 photos but I can’t upload them, instead I’ve linked to a 360 photo so you can see inside the church –
Click here for a virtual reality view of the cathedral
its far better than any pics we could take – the church is just amazing (I will probably say that a lot over the next few weeks!)
the boys singing – beautiful! listen to it on this video: This video (not ours) is of the boys singing in the Cathedral
After visiting the church we spent more time looking around outside..
There were at least four fashion bloggers there taking photos but these two girls were real pros, I saw them in four changes of clothing and they did some great poses for their photos…
The convent half way down the mount..
We drove down the mountain on the opposite side so that we could see this view – just spectacular!
a bit of history about Montserrat…
The mountain has had a religious significance since pre- Christian era and the Romans built a temple to worship Venus there. The christian history of the area starts in 880 when a group of children saw lights coming from the mountain, these were attributed to angels. Hermit monks lived on the mountain and built small hermitages which eventually expanded into four monasteries, three still used today.
In the 12th century miracles were attributed to the discovery of ‘Our Lady of Montserrat’ ( not a ‘black madonna’ as she is often mistakenly called)- a wooden statue found in a cave in the mountains. Our guide explained how this has been influenced by the ongoing wars and the need for a symbol to unite the Catalan people as they faced invasion by the Moors. The Lady of Serrat is part of the national identity of the Catalan people.
Napoleon saw the strategic value in ‘ capturing’ the Lady – as she had become such a powerful national symbol – he came to the area and soldiers searched for the statue, killing over a thousand monks who refused to reveal where she was hidden. The statue was never captured and it remains a great national treasure today. Over the years many miracles were attributed to the Lady and the area became a site for pilgrimages and then modern day tourists.
The pictures just don’t capture how beautiful the church and the mountains are in real life. Its just absolutely stunning! Definitely a highlight of the trip – and it’s only day 2. There is a museum here and so much more to see but we ran out of time. Its a place I’d come back to visit again given the chance.
day 2 and still more to come…
we made our way back to Barcelona for more sightseeing.