Off To Montserrat, Wondering If We’ve Offended The Powers Above.

The day after I watched my husband eat raw meat, when I’d thought we were departing Barcelona, I was incorrect. We had another full day planned.

Day four and I’ve already lost track.

Our tour guide Beatrice (she reminded me of Isabella Rossellini) picked us up in our hotel at 8:30am and we were set for a seven hour tour. SEVEN HOURS.

We were excited about this excursion, which started with an hour+ drive; Beatrice has such a light and fun personality, which is great because things went sideways. Upon arriving at Montserrat, we were flagged by the Park Police to pull over. Beatrice assured us that it wasn’t a big deal, but also said: “Ok, if they ask, we are visiting Montserrat for a few hours, and then I’m taking you to a winery.” Which was all true, but why did we need to get our stories straight?

The three of us were instructed to exit the van, then we had to answer questions separate from Beatrice. The police were serious, and didn’t speak a lick of English, so The Montserrat Popo used a translator on his phone to ask Coach the questions. Generally I ‘d be all, hey, ask me the questions, I am woman, I am strong, but also, I didn’t want to go to jail because I’m too soft for jail, knowing they’d never let me bring my special pillow, so I left our fate in the Coach’s hands while I just stood there looking as innocent as I could.

It was silly, but a little nerve-racking not knowing what the hell Beatrice did wrong. Turns out that they were training new Park Popo on this date and needed to see all of her Tour Guide Paperwork. She was shocked by it, but assured us everything would be fine. Eventually Coach and I were able to depart the scene and wait for her at the overlook area, but it took over an hour.

LET ME SEE YOUR PAPERS! Eventually, there were popo on both sides of us, checking other tour vans too. We were surrounded!

After we were able to flee the scene, we waited for Beatrice while looking at the views, just taking it all in. The weather seemed to be changing a bit, which was foreshadowing, but for the moment it was lovely. (Montserrat was discovered in the ninth century; a stature of Virgin Mary (Black Madonna) was found here in a cave and this became a very important religious site then and now and houses a historical monastery and the Boys Choir of Spain. Mass still happens daily. But also people come from all around to enjoy the hiking, biking, police inquisitions and overall beauty of the area.

We were wondering if perhaps Beatrice had been taken to the big house, but finally, she showed up just as it started raining. Luckily, I had my raincoat with me, and she brought two umbrellas. We made our way up to the Monastery as the rain was coming down so hard and even with my raincoat and them having umbrellas, we were soaked, lighting and thunder were crashing down. I was starting to get the hint that the Monastery didn’t want us to visit.

Finally, we get into the monastery waiting area, along with another hundred people, fleeing the rain; within minutes of waiting our turn to enter the Basilica, the temps drop about 10-15 degrees, and then we see hail coming down outside. People were astonished as hail is rare here and they were all exclaiming GRAZIO! GRAZIO!

We were all soaked and cold.

We had to wait for mass to end which took about 30 minutes, then we were able to see the inside of the cathedral; it was gorgeous. This place has been in existence for a thousand years, but had been destroyed twice and rebuilt. Once ruined by Napoleon, then again in the Spanish Civil civil war in 1936.

We departed the interior to give room for others to enjoy and we went to a side area of the cathedral to see if the hail would slow down so we could get out of dodge, but it wasn’t happening.

After another ten minutes or so, it slowed down enough for us to make the ten minute walk back to the van. Ya’ll, our socks/shoes were drenched and we were heading to a winery. We took them off, hoping they might dry a bit on the forty minute drive, but also I was wondering if shoes were required in Spains wineries.

See the hail on the building roof?
I just realized we have matching socks

This was a sweet little winery; they fed us a beautiful lunch and we sipped on fantastic local wines, still drying off and trying to forget the horrendous weather we’d just departed.

I think Coach and I both nodded off on our hour drive back to the hostel. Was that from the wine? The good food? The fact that we’d survived the police investigation AND the scary storm? Probably all of the above.

You’d think this was enough for one day, but nope. We had a three hour tour a few hours later; I’m starting to wonder if Martha, our travel specialist thought that we were twenty years old.

Have you been to Montserrat?

XO

25 thoughts on “Off To Montserrat, Wondering If We’ve Offended The Powers Above.”

  3. My parents were once visiting St. Petersburg and questioned by armed Russian soldiers for heaven-knows-why. That had to be damn frightening. Probably they didn’t encounter a hailstorm after, at least. What did you do to piss off the gods anyway?

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  5. I enjoyed your videos, so thank you! What an experience, but hey, you have a great story that you will remember for the rest of your life. I’d have been sweating about the police inquisition. And I wouldn’t have been happy about being soaked, but I guess it was all worth it as you sipped your Cava and Rioja.

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    1. Bijoux, you would think I could remember these stories forever, but that isn’t what seems to be happening, so I’m keeping them here on the blog. 😉 Hopefully I’ll never forget my web address!

      Oh, I had no idea how much I would enjoy Spanish wines!

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  6. Have you been to Montserrat? I have not but it looks intriguing. I’d go despite the weirdness you had getting there. Overall it looks wonderful and the wine would make it all okay.

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    1. Overall it was a unique and gorgeous place to visit! The wine did make it better, but honestly, I could have easily gone back to the hotel for a nap instead.

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  9. that’s a lot of touring! … did you get tired of it, and just want to do your own thing?

    beautiful scenery! thanks for sharing with us ❤ .

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    1. Ren, it was a lot of touring and there will be much more. Like everyday—some days there are two tours. Honestly, it seems like a lot, but what else were we to do there? We wouldn’t have had nearly the experiences if we did it on our own.

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  12. I’d have been terrified by the whole police thing. Nightmare. That sort of unexpected scenario would have made me a wreck. After that, I’d have demanded to be taken straight to the booze. On the double.

    I’ve not had many Spanish wines, but I do love a good Tempranillo. Have you had much of that, and do you like it?

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    1. It made me a bit nervous, but I was sure we would be fine. I mean, we weren’t in Bogota or Russia–it was Barcelona, so I knew we’d survive.

      I’ve never had Tempranillo, nor have I heard of it. I was introduced to so many good wines, but I couldn’t retell you the names of any of them with certainty.

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  13. No way. This sounds so stressful. A 7 hour tour is a lengthy day. When I went on a horse pack trip with my dad and my youngest brother and my same age cousin my junior year of high school, the guides took us into the mountains (by horse, mind you). We were on horse ALL.DAMN.DAY. We were fine. It was beautiful, but my dad? Not so much. He was mumbling under his breath: WHAT ARE THESE ASS HOLES TRYING TO PROVE? Dad was rewarded with a saddle sore that bled through his jeans. Bah ha!

    When I was in Prague with my brother and his roomies while studying abroad, we’d been over-served and were struggling to use the key to get into our accommodation. The neighbors called the cops and real live soldiers showed up and demanded our passports. It wasn’t exactly legal for Charles (the guy who offered us accommodation at the train station) to rend his place to us, so we acted as if he was our cousin Charles. I thought THIS IS IT. WE’RE GONNA ROT IN A PRISON IN PRAGUE.

    Wet socks and shoes would’ve really put a damper on my day. I think you got to go back to your room and change before the next several hours, right? The view – breath taking. I’ve never even heard of this place, so nope – haven’t visited. What an amazing trip.

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    1. It was somewhat stressful, but hey, we were on vacation! I couldn’t complain at all, stuff happens.

      We did get to shower, change and rest a bit before our next outing. Thank goodness for that.

      The all day horse back ride sounds horrible. Plain and simple: Horrible. 🤣

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