What to do and see in Sant Cugat del Valles, Catalonia: The Best Budget-friendly Things to do

Reviewed By periandro - Luxembourg City, Luxembourg

San Cugat monastery is an imposing religious building complex. As one gets closer to it for the first time it's already possible to appreciate the wonder which is within sight and guess the marvellous interior which will be beheld upon entering the church or the cloister. Both are rich architectural masterpieces. As far as the church is concerned, its outer part is basically in gothic style safe a few additions. The front façade thereof is really astounding particularly because of the ornamented rose window elaborate manufacture and the size thereof. It counts among the four biggest rose windows in Catalonia and from outside it looks like stone embroidery. It's something really deserving to be admired through careful observation. Apart from the rose window, the other outstanding element of that part of the façade is the portal. The eleven pointed arches decreasing in size the closer they are to the door are supported respectively by twenty two semidetached pillars, eleven on each side, with their corresponding capitals. On the pediment there is a painting depicting the Epiphany. Under the same there are two stout doors apparently from the XV century. Over the pillar betwixt the doors there is a statue of the Virgin which is relatively modern. The whole ensemble formed by the portal and the rose window above is really fantastic. Inside the church it's very interesting to observe the combination of romanesque and gothic styles thus revealing a pure transition style. Altogether, the austerity and the gravity of the place is indeed striking. In its inception it was a four aisle church but nowadays the fourth aisle on the right hand side looking at the high altar is no longer perceptible inasmuch as three baroque chapels were built in it in the XVI century. The central nave is the tallest of the three surviving aisles and the width of the side ones is different from each one of them. In the place where the ancient choir was located there are some tombs concerning former abbots. Other abbot tombs can be also found in the rest of the church, the cloister and the chapter house. In general such tombs have not much interest. The octagonal and well ornamented dome is of a great beauty. It's basically in gothic style with some romanesque and arabesque strokes. It settles on the four most solid columns of the nave. The apse behind the high altar is really marvellous. One may become amazed looking at the graceful triumphal arch with a white marble balustrade with red inlays. The huge altar table made of stone dates back to the XV century. The whole apse is in romanesque style except the large window, the light coming in through it being mitigated by an altarpiece. At the end of the right aisle there is a romanesque apse presided over by a reredos of St. Mary of All Saints. It's a beautiful reredos by Pere Serra, one of the best Catalan painters of the fifteenth century. That artwork was destined to be in the incumbent chapel, which is the current sacristry. The doors of that room are very well elaborate and perfectly restored. In the sacristry room one can watch several nice items, among them a painting depicting St. Benedict and St. Escholastica, the old relic cupboard and a washstand from 1752. Under the belfry tower there is a nice chapel dedicated to the Pietà. It had belonged to the previous church in romanesque style and it's worth observing there, among other objects, a beautiful sculpture from the beginning of the eighteenth century by Josep Sala. Furthermore, among the items existing in the aforesaid three baroque chapels there are some valuable works of art which should be carefully observed: a baroque reredos and a painting of the apostle in that one dedicated to St. Bartholomew (the first one) and a splendid image of the Virgin on the altar of that dedicated to St. Benedict (that in the middle). Apart from the foregoing, everywhere in that chrch it's possible to find marvels of a great value, such as the organ, in romanesque style, the cloister portal and the reredos of the Virgin of the Rosary and the Archangel St. Michael, the two last mentioned ones in renaissance style. It's therefore a fabulous monument whose visit is undoubtedly worthwhile. The monastery cloister is in itself a great marvel on account of divers features, such as its size, the columns capitals and the barrel vault capping the galleries on the groundfloor. The whole makes any sensitive being have the feeling of a great harmony. Already at the cloister hall it's possible to admire the beauty of the ensemble which, apart from the aforesaid parts the vault timber beams and the 144 columns and their respective capitals are outstanding. In one of those capitals, that on the corner before the decapitated image of St. Mary the Big there is the name of the sculptor, Arnau Cadell, in a legend written in Latin. The sentence reads as follows: “Hec est Arnalli scultoris forma Catelli qui claustrum tale construxit perpetuale”. The four galleries forming the cloister enclosure has each one its own name. That on the West is the ”cellar gallery”; that on the North is kown as the “little monks gallery”; that on the East is the “chapter gallery”, and the name of that on the South is the “main gallery” or the “church gallery”. In the cellar gallery there is the erstwhile door to the cloister in front of a column with a capital showing the well set table of the richman Apollo and Lazarus, the poor man eating the former's crumbs. In the little monks gallery one can see the ancient refectory, most of which turned into the new chapter house from the thirteenth century. Next to that there is a beautiful barroquised portal through which one may accede to a newer chapter house (it changed again in the eighteenth century). In the chapter gallery one may find several elements worth being observed. Among them, a romanesque door leading outside the cloister; the office; the staircase to go up to the upper cloister storey, and a room for a certain time having again been the chapter house and which in the eighteenth century became the funereal chapel for monks and abbots (in it the portal and the windows in a transitional gothic style are rather interesting, especially the large window at the back already in a very elaborate gothic style), and finally the church gallery whose contemplation is much amazing thanks to the wonderful florid romanesque doorway, which is a real jewel. By and large, the cloister offers the visitors a wonderful view also from the cloister yard in whose center a well and a fountain make one have a feeling of appeasement. From that point it's possible to observe all the beauty of the upper coister storey in an elegant but simple renaissance style. Consequently, it's worth going to Sancugat del Vallés for instance by train from Barcelona city to visit that stupendous complex of religious architecture. It's a gorgeous and and impressive work which may centainly leave a trace in any sentitive being's soul.