Airport pickup

Why get  stressed trying to find your way out of the airport with a rental car or figure out the train/bus timetables in a different language?

Let us pick you up and take you directly to where you are staying, where after getting your bearings, you can decide whether to rent a car locally or use public transport to get around.

We can take bikes and any number of passengers with a few days notice and transfers between airports as well.

Airports served: Barcelona; Girona/Costa Brava; Perpignan

Prices on request

info@discovergirona.net

Montserrat – Nature meets Religion

Montserrat is only some 50kms from Barcelona and yet feels like a different world. Forget the Ramblas and Mediterranean casual seaside lethargy, this is a combination of the Grand Canyon crossed with Saint Marks Square and it is amazing!
There is a choice of three ways to ascend this strange landscape from below; by a modern funicular, by cable car or by road but the religious types may even consider walking depending on how penitent they feel.
For non-believers there are some great hikes around some incredible basalt rock formations with views of deep ravines and small villages below.
The real action is back at the Monastery where there are plenty of chances to save your soul in the Chapel, visit the Black Madonna, light a candle for a loved one, visit one of the best art collections of mainly Catalan artists or sit and watch the hordes of people from all over the world milling around.
A great day out will be had by all, nature overwhelms religion, but what a combination!

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Empuries Greco-Roman ruins

Empuries is only some 30 minutes drive from Girona and is right next to l'Escala on the coast in a beautiful setting of sand dunes and pine trees. This area was first settled by Iberian tribes but it is really with the arrival of the civilizing Greeks in approx 300BC that both building and commerce began. Empurion, as it was known, was connected to many other trading ports around the Mediterranean, all eventually supplying the main markets of Greece and Italy with wine, olive oil, nuts ( almonds and hazelnuts), hides and wheat.
This trade became so important that the Romans decided to take over the whole Iberian peninsula to guarantee their supplies for an expanding empire. The remains we see today show a very sophisticated and prosperous community which enjoyed saunas, cultural entertainment, gymnastics and music which even today we can feel envious of.

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Besalú – medieval gem

Besalú is worth a trip just for the bridge but add in the narrow cobbled streets, the two churches and a rare Jewish micvah and you have the perfect day trip destination.There are cafes and restaurants where you can sit outside watching life passing by or wandering around the shops full of local specialities like cured sausages or chocolate pastries.
This was an important trading centre in the Middle Ages and has retained much of its charm by virtue of being perfectly preserved in a mountain setting with a river and the massive fortified bridge dominating everything. If you are coming to Girona to visit a trip to Besalú is a must.

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La Torre B&B prices

Prices for La Torre in 2009 are based on Bed and Breakfast (Continental) per person.
B&B 40?/night 250?/week
Evening meal available by arrangement @ 25? per head including wine (min 2 people)
Cooking facilities 8?/day 40?/week

Special rates for booking La Torre as a whole, please ask for prices.
Contact  tel: 0034 607 262 102 email:  info@discovergirona.net

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La Torre B&B interior

La Torre has kept the charm of the restored stone walls and added modern windows for light and is furnished in a comfortable modern style. There are 7 bedrooms, 5 doubles and 2 twins, all with en-suite bathrooms with shower. It is set up for the maximum convenience of their guests privacy with plenty of quiet places on 4 levels, 2 fireplaces, 4 sitting rooms, 2 kitchens and 3 dining areas as well as the terrace outside and the Lemon Tree garden which guests are welcome to use.
There is a small swimming pool also available and sun loungers provided on the roof. There is a well stocked reading room and a vaulted dining room that seats 14.

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La Torre B&B location

La Torre is a medieval fortified farmhouse where the only remains from that period is the tower from which there are spectacular views over the Pyrenees and Costa Brava in the distance and the protected natural park of Les Gavarres on the doorstep.
This is a very peaceful base from which there are plenty of nice walks into the park or all the way to Girona on paths over the hills. The village of Celrà is only a 5 mins walk and has local shops, banks and bars as well as an old part of town around the church.
Ideally you need a car for easy access and to take advantage of the Costa Brava (20 mins away) and interesting places like Pubol, part of Dali’s legacy to his wife Gala which is only a 10 min drive away and the medieval villages of Madremanya and the pottery centre of La Bisbal.
La Torre could not be easier to reach from Girona airport (20 mins) and the main motorway that goes south to Barcelona (1 hr) and north to the French border (50 mins). Getting into the Old Town of Girona to explore the Jewish quarter or the Cathedral is a 10 min drive and here there is a wide variety of good restaurants, terraces to sit on and shops to tempt you as well as the open air market on tuesdays and saturdays in the Devesa park.

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Sabadell Modernist walk

Sabadell is a town of 200,000 people just to the north of Barcelona and less than an hours drive from Girona. It has  been an important industrial centre ever since the late 19th century specialising in textiles, metalwork and other building materials like bricks, tiles and glass. To show off their new wealth architects were commissioned to build both residential and industrial projects which reflected the Catalan penchant for Modernism.
There are some truly spectacular buildings dotted around the centre of town, and many small details like window shapes or coloured tiles and wrought iron balconies which if you keep your head up you will discover easily. The local banks have done great restoration and preservation work for some of the larger factories which have been transformed into modern offices or exhibition spaces.
From water towers to park benches and lamp posts this urban architecture is still used and hopefully appreciated on a daily basis.

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Barcelona 22@ high tech district

Barcelona is only an hours drive from Girona and a visit to the exciting urban renewal project that is 22@ is easy to get to from the motorway. The first thing you notice is the cucumber building next to the Glories roundabout and along the Diagonal road there are now dozens of really interesting looking modern office buildings and housing projects which are being built to house some of the best of Spains high tech industry.
The Barcelona city council decided in 2001 to revitalise an old industrial and poor housing area called Poblenou using new urban planning codes to encourage replacing old factories and housing with modern facilities and some public buildings including university research centres and an international conference centre. Established businesses as well as start-ups in growth sectors like media, medical technology, energy research and IT were to form the core of this new environment complemented by parks and with the beach only a short walk away this is a great location. The new station for the high speed train is also being built in this area linking Madrid and Paris in a journey which will only take a few hours from Barcelona when it is finished.
As  with many publicly funded initiatives over the last few years some building speculation by landowners in the area is evident from the empty holes with fences surrounding them but my surprise was that quite a lot has been built already and even more are about to be completed.  With the economy here suffering at least as much as elsewhere, and some would argue more, it will be interesting to see if these new offices are occupied, especially by the start-ups and small businesses that were envisaged at the outset.
Meanwhile, it is a great place to walk around to see how an old and run down part of town gets a second chance, and hopefully the mix of resident, visitor and worker will blend into a really interesting and dynamic part of Barcelona.

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Vilobí d’Onyar- a sunday walk

Sundays are for exercise and this was certainly the idea when about 1,500 of us converged on the village of Vilobí (12 kms from Girona) for the "marxa popular" which has become an institution locally. These events are organised by local walking groups where as well as marking the route clearly they provide water/oranges/hot chocolate along the way and at the finish give everyone a present and a snack.These are serious events and some people choose to run but most walk and in this case there were a 10km or a longer 15km route to choose from.
The start was at 8am and since we are in january there was a frost on the ground but after an hour the sun had re established itself and by midday everyone was in shirtsleeves; the joy of a Spanish winter, cold nights followed by clear warm days. The route could not have been nicer, passing by some impressive old farmhouses (masias) some with sundials painted on their front walls and a variety of chickens and animals, not all domesticated by the sound and smell of them!
We went through two villages with impressive chapels, Salitja and Sant Dalmai, and in between the path followed a stream with weeping willows that reminded me of walks I have taken in Britain. As is typical here everyone was so busy talking that nobody paid any attention to what they were passing but all stopped at the first refuelling stop to take on hot chocolate (150kgs were made and consumed). This only had the effect of speeding up peoples tongues even more, especially since the temperature was rising quickly too.
The long route went along the top edge of the crater of an extinct volcano called La Crosa which is worth a walk in itself. After a couple hours of what can really only be described as talking while moving gently in a vaguely circular route we ended up back at the school playground where we received our present (a wooly hat with the 3 churches we passed stiched on) and the serious business of eating began.
First comes the sausage (botifarra) sandwich which is cooked over coals which were part of a bonfire which I had noticed some of the inner group of walkers huddling around in the cold dawn and had a dual purpose, clearly. On tables spread all around the playground were plates of salad, potato chips, water and the Catalan porro. This is a glass vessel for drinking wine without touching your mouth to the opening which provides hilarious results when novices attempt to catch the spouting wine in their open mouths, usually the last place that it ends up…
Just when you were thinking that this snack could possibly be lunch it's time for dessert and black coffee with a shot of either brandy or anis (a liqueur) just to make sure you float back to your car or start the whole painless route again!

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