Vultures

There was recently an article in the local paper about several small Romanesque churches that are hidden away and neglected in small villages all around this area. People are now starting to recognize them for the treasures that they are, especially since tourists like to go and see them. I had never seen or heard of most of them so I decided I would seek them out.

Friday seemed as good a time as any to find the first one, and I called Josep – he of the ants -- who still doesn’t have his car back from the shop, to see if he wanted to come. He did. But he thought we should go to the sanctuary Mare de Déu del Mont. This was not on the list. However, he’s been going on about this Mare de Déu for a couple of years. He says it’s very close by. You take the highway towards Olot, turn off, and then go a ways – not too far – up a road that has some curves. He knows I don’t do well on curves. Those curves and Covid are the reasons why I never went there with him. And anyway, on Friday my idea was to see one of those Romanesque churches. But Mare de Déu del Mont has a VIEW, he said. Never mind that it was not a particularly clear day.

We went to Mare de Déu del Mont. That little road wasn’t simply curvy. It was the windiest road I’ve ever been on. It started out being wide enough for two cars, but it narrowed down to about a lane and a half. Keep in mind that small roads here usually have no shoulder. And on that lane and a half were countless curves and 11 of the tightest hairpin turns I’ve ever seen (I counted them later on a map). I never got out of second gear. If a car was coming the other way on a hairpin, you wouldn’t see it until it was smack in front of you and the one coming downhill would have to back up for the one going uphill to pass by. It went on and on for about 18 very long kilometers. Thank God, (or the Mare de Déu) that I was the one doing the driving; if not I would have been a very sick girl. If Josep was gritting his teeth, it served him right.

Thankfully, I never did encounter a car coming in the opposite direction on any of those hairpins, in fact there were almost no cars – just several bicyclists and one lone man walking. Hats off to all of them.

Josep had also mumbled something about Romanesque, and there it was. About half way up was the 10^th century Benedictine abbey of Sant Llorenç de Sous. Founded in 922, it was celebrating its 1100^th anniversary. Damaged by earthquakes in the 15^th century, it was finally abandoned in the 18^th.

It was after the abbey that we encountered all those hairpin curves. Once at the top, yes, the view was gorgeous. There was the plain below dotted with crops and villages; the hills of La Garotxa, many of them inactive volcanos; I picked out the village of Besalú; and of course, the magnificent snow-covered mountain Canigó, which I see often, from further away, on my walks at Vilabertran and also from the beach at Empuriabrava. 

Besalú and the hills of Garrotxa

The lone walker on the right, talking with another visitor

Canigó, at the eastern end of the Pyrenees, is situated in France, but that part of France was once part of Catalonia. At 2784 meters, it is the highest peak in the area and can be seen from all over northern Catalonia and southern France. It has a special meaning to Catalans and the Catalan flag flies at its top. There is a tradition on the 23^rd of June, the eve of Sant Joan (Saint John, the summer solstice) to build a big bonfire at the top of the mountain. People come from all over Catalonia to light torches from that bonfire and take them to their towns and villages to have nighttime marches and light local bonfires.

Shifting over and looking towards Besalú, first one flew by, then two, then several, then a dozen. Vultures. Griffon vultures.

When he got to the top, I congratulated that lone walker on his climb, He replied that it was just a stroll. I asked him if he knew anything about the birds and he explained to me that they had disappeared from the area years ago, following the livestock farms into less populated areas in the Pyrenees, but recently the Catalan government was reintroducing them by putting out food on the nearby cliffs. I had thought they were falcons, but he said no. Falcons flap their wings; the vultures just glide with the air currents.

A Romanesque church, a spectacular view of snow-covered Canigó, a kettle of vultures, and the adventure of driving on the windiest road in the world in my little 20-year-old Citroen. It was a good day.