Besalú a beautiful medieval city of Catalonia
February 13, 2018Besalú is a medieval town in Catalonia, in Spain, near the city of Barcelona, its main attraction is a Roman bridge of the tenth century, the city has most of the houses and buildings made of stone, leaving the city with the air even more medieval.
Since we moved to Barcelona, You will know Besalú, then on a weekend in November, we were there enjoying the off season and rented a car for only 18 euros, We rented from Friday afternoon until Sunday afternoon.
The town is very small, has only 2.500 population, so the city does not have many hotel options, then we had the idea of staying in a rural hotel in a close town, the delight hotel that we called more Campoler (see the post about the hotel) It has a romantic inn style like the Jordan Fields region, São Bento do Sapucai, Green Mount, Teresopolis…
Besalú It shows an architectural and urban structure quite consistent with the medieval past. The monumental importance of the city is mainly due to its great value as a whole, due to their unit, that determines how one of the most important and unique examples of medieval sets of Catalonia.
What to do Besalú and what are its main attractions?
We arrived on Friday night at the hotel and stayed there enjoying the fireplace, in the morning we went to visit the city of Besalú, and we soon know the bridge, which we commented be the main attraction, a Roman Ponte de Besalú, she has an angular shape with seven unequal arches, many of them based on live rocks, with cuts, beyond the arches has an old access gate, fortified overlaps the first pillar of the bridge.
The first news of the bridge are the tenth century, but it may be before it, it has undergone many changes and reconstructions.
Previously the bridge serving to input Castle Besalú, but today there is no more, like many cities of medieval times, the city grew around the castle, besides Romans lived there too many Jews.
On the banks of the river where the bridge has a very beautiful park, with places to picnic, in the summer and that should also be used by the residents of the city as “Beach”, and from the banks has a beautiful bridge and Besalú views.
After seeing the bridge from different angles and we walk by it, We went to visit other city attractions, like Monastery of St. Peter of Besalú, It is another highlight of the city, It is in a central square with a few restaurants around.
There also has an interesting museum, they are sculptures created in grains, O Museum of Miniatures and microthumbs Besalú, to see all the work you need to see for a magnifying glass that is in front of each sculpture.
Right next to the bridge, with her to view, It has a Jewish bath, only it was closed when we were in the city, then we can not visit.
Soon it was lunchtime and we had booked a restaurant which has a tasting menu, where the chef prepares dishes of the day and serves these dishes, You do not have what you choose, the only thing that the chief question is whether you have any restrictions with some kind of food, as we do not have it served all rs, This menu consists of five dishes, delicious food and you can even match the wines that it harmonizes with the food, we did that, it was excellent, we do not talk you out of there rolling, but very happy and it was not expensive, Super menu well served out around 18 EUR per person, more wines that were a more 5 glasses of different delicious wines per person, if I remember are a few more 10 EUR per person, out the chef who is super friendly, It explains all of each dish and the restaurant is a free and very cozy, We stayed there over 2 hours. He was in the mood to eat there? Want to know the name? Of course we will count the é restaurant or with the five senses (the name is in Catalan means “With Fives Senses”), a very important thing to know is necessary to book in advance as, for lunch and dinner there only with reservation, we saw several people trying to get in and not be able to because he spoke it was only with reservation.
After this wonderful lunch we continue to walk through all the medieval alleys of the city, we spent in Church St Vincent and one of the last things we visited was the St. Martin Church.
Our last stop was staying at a bar and restaurant Castle Besalú overlooking the bridge, and there we took a wine, enjoying the sight and the dark, the bridge is also beautiful all lit up.
After all this it was time to go back to the hotel, and the next day we went to visit other beautiful cities that were: Castellfollit de la Roca a city high on a cliff, very interesting and then also went to Olot and Vic, very nice too.
