The Visigoth

the visigoth

Living In: Alella

Living In: Alella

El Maresme, the Catalan super-commuter belt. Crowded trains hugging the seafront. Exclusive casas pareadas, yummy-mummy SUVs and all those signs of well-heeled and somehow out-of-bounds suburbia. Yes, it's a bit pijo - check out Sant Andreu de Llavaneres, the self-styled 'Super-Maresme with all its 24-hour surveillance golf-course gardens and periscope mansions). But, the Maresme has some delicious corners; milennial vineyards, good rambling routes, precious scenery and hands

Postcards from the Ledge: Barcelona's Congost Valley

Postcards from the Ledge: Barcelona's Congost Valley

Congost. It sounds vaguely like some unpleasant genus of winged insect. In actual fact, it’s the Catalan word for canyon. There are some fine examples of congosts in Catalonia. Not least, the remarkably slender Congost de Montrebei or its more sweeping cousin Congost del Mur (both near Balaguer). Also known as Gorg Negre (‘black gorge’) and located between the Montseny and Bertí massifs, Barcelona’s very own Congost Valley seems at first glance like many other pine-stacked go

Exploration of Catalonia's Nether Parts: Castellet i la Gornal

Exploration of Catalonia's Nether Parts: Castellet i la Gornal

Castellet i la Gornal is not somewhere many people have heard of. But it’s the site of one of Catalonia’s handsomest devils of a castle and it has a fine position over the Foix reservoir, with the vineyards of the Alt Penedés rolling away in one direction and the pine forests of the Garraf in the other. Approached from the coast at Vilanova it’s a lovely 14 kilometre drive up the meandering Foix river. The village is a gorgeous, golden-stoned medieval pile, mostly well-prese

Classic Sunday Excursions from Barcelona in Winter

Death to Saloufest

Death to Saloufest

Critic Peter S. Beagle, writing about Hieronymus Bosch's Garden of Earthly Delights, commented on the 'erotic derangement that turns us all into voyeurs, a place filled with the intoxicating air of perfect liberty.' For decades Spain has been sold as such a place, a place of 'perfect liberty', by budget tour companies. In particular, for the last sixteen years British students have converged in the handsome Costa Dorada locality of Salou, intent on turning it into a scene fro

La Mercè 2016

La Mercè 2016

'The most daring, accessible, surprising, decentralized, participative and innovative one ever' according to its organizers, Barcelona's biggest annual cultural festival starts this weekend. Here's a - mercèfully brief - guide to the 21 venues, 300-odd acts and special themes of this year's event. Un signo de fraternidad: Following the terrorist attacks on Paris last year, Barcelona's mayoress Ada Colau contacted her Parisian counterpart Anne Hidalgo to suggest a cultural col

El Toro de La Vega: A Festival of Life and Death

El Toro de La Vega: A Festival of Life and Death

His name is Pelado - ''baldie.'He's a strapping, handsome bull weighing 675 kilos, and he was born and raised on a farm near Jerez de la Frontera. He has had the honour - and misfortune - to be chosen as el Toro de La Vega, the 'Bull of the Meadow'. Every year on September 13, the town of Tordesillas - 28 km southwest of Valladolid, population 9000 - holds its annual event, one of the most controversial, and divisive in Spain. This event is described by its local Ayuntamiento

Medina Azahara: Excavation or Building Site?

Medina Azahara: Excavation or Building Site?

Named after a beautiful concubine of Abd al-Rahman III, Medina Azahara is a Moorish palace on a lush mount overlooking the plains to the west of Cordoba. In 929 it was the capital of the Islamic state of Al-Andalus, 'the Versailles of the Middle Ages'. Now the roots of ancient trees wrap the palace’s tumbled stones in a skeletal embrace; sacked centuries ago, many of its rocks were carried off to Cordoba, five miles away, for the construction of churches and civic buildings.

Walden 7: Architecture Inspired by Social Experiment

Walden 7: Architecture Inspired by Social Experiment

Rising like a termite mound out of the suburb of Sant Just Desvern, Walden 7 has long been considered an epic achievement in design failure. Every day groups of student architects form in its shadow, furiously scribbling in their notebooks as they try to make sense of it. A clay-red, curving, 'vertical labyrinth' consisting of 18 towers, with apartments made up of one or more 30 square metre modules accessed via a vertiginous maze of inner stairwells and patios, the building

A Jewel on the Valencian Coast: Montgó Natural Park

A Jewel on the Valencian Coast: Montgó Natural Park

It's a microclimate of tantalizing floral and geological diversity, with wildflowers, limestone caves, rousing views, secluded bays and kooky cottages, just over an hour south of Valencia. Viewed from Xábia, the elegant town on its southern slopes, the natural park of Montgó is often said to resemble the head and trunk of an elephant. The 753 metre-tall mountain which dominates the park - the elephant's head - is a beacon for hikers, but it's the rocky headland of Cape Sant A

Barcino-etymology: The Origins of Barcelona

Barcino-etymology: The Origins of Barcelona

Thanks to the Alexandrian map-maker Ptolomy we know that a city called Barcino existed on the site of modern-day Barcelona in the Second Century BC. But where did the Romans get the name Barcino from? Did it come from an earlier 'Celto-Iberian' settlement? Or the Carthaginians perhaps? The following hypothesis about the origin of the word Barcino, from Historias y Leyendas de Barcelona by Joan de Deu Prats, is a fun one: 'On the shore of the River Rubricatus (now known as the

Forget The Beach: Five Aquatic Alternatives This Summer

Forget The Beach: Five Aquatic Alternatives This Summer

Forget laying about in piles of cigarettes and beer cans, while beer-sellers kick sand on your towel, loud guiris in sombreros cry 'Oy!Oy!' and kids dive-bomb into the surf. There's better stuff to do in summer. Like swimming in the handsome Ebro river at medieval Miravet. Or flippering up for the rapids at Llavorsi. Or how about aqua-trekking in the Sierra de Guara? Here's five alternatives to hitting the beach. Miravet A typical Baix Ebre town painted in pastel shades and h

Spanish Mythologies: The Real Cervantes

Spanish Mythologies: The Real Cervantes

Last week it was the 400th anniversary of the death of Miguel de Cervantes, Spain's most celebrated writer. His flagship work, Don Quixote is the story of an ageing knight who can't separate fact from fiction. But how do we separate fact from fiction when it comes to the author's own life? What we know about Cervantes the man comes from his own quill - fleeting cameos in fictional narratives. Can we gain a clear picture of who he was from these cameos in his books? Is there a

Who is: Sant Jordi

Who is: Sant Jordi

Occupation: Patron Saint of Catalunya. And lots of other places. Appearance: Visored helmet, chainmail. Tunic emblazones with a red cross on it. You mean Saint George, that Italian chap who killed a dragon. Contrary to his traditional depiction, experts now claim the Saint was from Capadoccia in Turkey. But yes. The one who, in European Christian folklore, rescued the damsel from the dragon. And inspires all that book for a flower stuff on April 23. Explain. The scent of ros

Valley of The Marmots: Coma de Vaca

Valley of The Marmots: Coma de Vaca

The ancient village of Queralbs has long been one of the most attractive gateways into the Pyrenees for hikers. At the northern edge of Catalonia's Ripollés region, it's accessed on the steep and spectacular cremallera (rack railway) line from Ribes de Freser, which eventually leads up to the popular ski station of Vall de Núria. Only six kilometres from the French border, iconic mountains surround the valley on every side - Puigmal (2913m), Infern (2896m) and Noufonts (2864m

Book Review: Barcelona 1700 by Albert Garcia Espuche

Book Review: Barcelona 1700 by Albert Garcia Espuche

This week in Book Review we delve into a well-preserved layer of Barcelona's history. Based on author Albert Garcia Espuche's own excavations at the Mercat del Born Cultural Centre, Barcelona 1700 provides a surprisingly lucid vision of life in the rebellious city before it was destroyed during Felipe V’s year-long siege in the Spanish War of Succession. The unprecedented archaeological finds are dusted off and categorized to piece together a picture of real citizens; where t

Off The Modernista Trail: Rubí

Off The Modernista Trail: Rubí

This week, it’s happily off the modernista trail we go, to the Industrial town of Rubí. It might not have ‘buenas tetas’ as one friend put it. In fact, it seems like the last place you’d enjoy getting lost for a day. But, explore a little, and you’ll find a spirited multicultural town full of hidden modernista treats, only 20 minutes on the train from Barcelona. A Catalan friend of mine once said that Rubí doesn’t have ‘buenas tetas.’ If you’ve ever driven past it on the C-16

In defence of: Terrassa

In defence of: Terrassa

A much-maligned city of some 200,000 inhabitants to the north of Barcelona, in the heavily overbuilt-up area known as the Vallés Occidental, Terrassa's got more than enough industrial pedigree and architectural durge to give it UNESCO crap town status. However, explore further, and Terrassa throws off its shackles, announcing itself as a curious crossover; an interesting crap town, well worth the 40-minute FGC ride from Barcelona. It's majestically located upon the lap of the

The Spanish Cult of Phantom Buildings

The Spanish Cult of Phantom Buildings

Back in 2012, BCN World was dreamed up as a macrocomplejo turístico with thematic leisure parks and casinos, shopping and convention centres and a hotel with a capacity for 12,000 guests. It was all to be bolted conveniently on to Salou’s Port Aventura and opened sometime this year. At the moment of writing, however, BCN World is a vacant space in a dusty descampado, gathering tumbleweed while it waits for a green light from the Plan Director Urbanístic (PDU). Could it be yet

Shit But Brilliant Trips: Aborted Mission to Sierra de Guara, 2003

The criteria for a bed were: as few ants as possible, a patch of grass which might best imitate a mattress and an enclosed space inconducive to large mammal hospitality. Long ago in the twilight of history, the city was called Bolskan and it was the capital of the Celto-Iberian Hergotes tribe. When it was absorbed into the Roman Empire the city became Victoria Urbs Osca, an academic centre for privileged young Iberians. When the Saracens took it in the 8th Century it became W

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