Being inside the mountain of Montserrat
Salnitre Cave
Located inside of Montserrat’s National Park Reserve, it is the best known cave and the one which summarises best the history of Catalan speleology.
This cave, at 549 metres above sea level, allows us to see the inside of the mountain. Visiting it means a subterranean trip that shows us the characteristics and result of a geological process acting on limy and conglomerate materials. For a long time it was the habitat of the first Neolithical inhabitants of Montserrat, becoming in time an inspiring place for Modernist artists such as Gaudí, Jacint Verdaguer or Rusiñol. Before they were opened to tourism, during the 1870s, they were also a good refuge for several bat species, like the Mediterranean horseshoe bat.
The most comfortable way of getting there is to go to Collbató, if possible on the third Sunday of the month, so that you can go to the Mercat de la Tradició. This will allow you to appreciate even more the town’s marked Medieval character. It is a good idea to have lunch there, and then around 4 pm get ready and go to the Àrea d’Esplai de la Salut, an open area in the outskirts of the town (within walking distance), where the tickets to the cave are sold.
A word of warning: The access to the cave has to be made after climbing up a flight of stairs with 244 steps (10 minutes at least!). Once inside the cave the temperature is 14ºC, with a 95% relative humidity, so taking a jumper or long sleeves with you is generally recommended. Finally, the visit, exclusively with a guide tour, lasts for about an hour, and this includes a video-documentary (in Catalan) , which summarises the history of the cave.
Timetable: Saturdays, Sundays and Bank Holidays, 10 am to 1 pm and 4.30 pm to 6.30 pm (last visit). During August it is open from Tuesday to Sunday. General ticket fee €7; reduced entrance fee (“Carnet Jove”, retired people, students and children between 5-12): €5.90. Information Office telephone number: 93.777.90.76
Moreover, in order to enjoy the town of Collbató fully, on the way back from the cave (or before going in) you should visit the Hermitage of La Salut (Ermita de la Salut), which was built in the second half of the 19th century, and was reconstructed between 1936-1939. A neo-Gothic style building, it presents a rectangular plant and a roof with double slopes. Its belfry is encased in an external wall tower, which crowns the front façade, and what nowadays is used as sacristy is located behind the nave of the hermitage. It can be accessed from behind the altar, where we can see ogival arches and alabastre capitals with Modernist motifs like rabbits, locusts and flowers. The sacristy’s walls are covered with paintings imitating architectonic graphisms
Source: www.infocostabrava.com
