So, Montserrat is \u00a0<\/span><\/span>well known as the site of the Benedictine<\/a> abbey<\/a>, Santa Maria de Montserrat<\/a>, which hosts the Virgin of Montserrat<\/a> sanctuary.\u00a0 It\u2019s a spectacular place built high up on the mountain with stunning views of the surrounding countryside.\u00a0 It is promoted as a peaceful place to meditate, contemplate, or generally enjoy the religious ambience.\u00a0 You can tour the grand monastery and associated chapels scattered over the mountain, the holy grotto, or listen to the Escolania, Montserrat\u2019s Boys\u2019 Choir, one of the oldest in Europe.\u00a0 Or take the funicular (rack railway for getting up steep inclines) up to the top of mount Sant Jeroni for some hiking and great views of the province of Catalan.<\/span><\/p>\n Yes, there are hordes of people.\u00a0 It\u2019s a stunning place, a destination spot for both tourists and pilgrims. And school children apparently.\u00a0 All of them!\u00a0 There must have been 15 thousand kids from all over Europe ranging in age from about 8 to 16.\u00a0 Lots of yelling and screaming, yes, in 5 or 6 different languages.\u00a0 Lots of running (in the form of races) around the basilica and up and down the hiking trails, yes.\u00a0 Lots of students who seem to need a backpack mini boom box for their favorite music, yes.\u00a0 Lots of meditation, no.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n It was a bit exhausting and so we left a little early to return to the peace and quiet of bustling Barcelona.\u00a0 It was worth seeing, we got some great photos, and we\u2019d go back again for the hiking and views.\u00a0 I\u2019m told there is a large population of feral cats that live at the monastery and some wild boar on the mountain, but the only wildlife we saw were the mall-rats<\/span>. <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n Montserrat, I mean, sorry.\u00a0 I was going to title this entry \u2018The Hordes\u2019 but hey, who doesn\u2019t like a smug little play on words.\u00a0 And in this case either title is appropriate.\u00a0 Don\u2019t get me wrong, as Montserrat is very high on the list of things to do when you are in Barcelona, but OMG!\u00a0 Maybe we timed it badly, low season and all, but really, \u2018European school day vacation, Montserrat\u2019.\u00a0 All that was missing were the Griswolds! So, Montserrat is \u00a0well known as the site of the Benedictine abbey, Santa Maria de Montserrat, which hosts the Virgin of Montserrat sanctuary.\u00a0 It\u2019s a spectacular place built high up on…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":307,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[6,1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/travelblog.lewington.ca\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/304"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/travelblog.lewington.ca\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/travelblog.lewington.ca\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/travelblog.lewington.ca\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/travelblog.lewington.ca\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=304"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"http:\/\/travelblog.lewington.ca\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/304\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1928,"href":"http:\/\/travelblog.lewington.ca\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/304\/revisions\/1928"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/travelblog.lewington.ca\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/307"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/travelblog.lewington.ca\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=304"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/travelblog.lewington.ca\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=304"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/travelblog.lewington.ca\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=304"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"http:\/\/travelblog.lewington.ca\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/Mallrat-683x1024.jpg\")
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