DISCOVERING S'AGARÓ & SANT POL ON THE COSTA BRAVA

Summer is always a time for reunions. Today, The Grandma has arrived in Sant Pol (Sant Feliu de Guíxols) to spend a few days with her dear friends Claire Fontaine, Joseph de Ca'th Lon and Corto Maltese.

They are enjoying two beautiful places full of history and natural beauty such as Sant Pol and S'Agaró. A well-deserved holidays after a very intense year. 

S'Agaró is an upmarket resort on the Costa Brava between Sant Feliu de Guíxols and Platja d'Aro. It is part of the municipality of Castell-Platja d'Aro, itself in the comarca of Baix Empordà and province of Girona in Catalonia. The resort was developed from the early 1920s on the peninsular between the beaches of Platja de Sant Pol and Platja de Sa Conca.

To date, the promontory contains about 60 exclusive houses and hotels. The world famous five-star Hostal de la Gavina dominates the view from Sant Pol beach. The original development has been declared as a historical complex and protected as a cultural asset of national interest since 1995.

The GR 92 long-distance footpath, which runs the length the Mediterranean coast, uses the historic camí de ronda that follows S'Agaró's coastline. The camí de ronda was rebuilt as part of the development, creating a walk in a semi-artificial landscape between sea, rocks and pines that integrates the urbanization with nature. To the north, the GR 92 crosses the beach of Sa Conca and diverts around the extensive Marina de Port d'Oro to reach Platja d'Aro. To the south it passes along the beach of Sant Pol to reach Sant Feliu de Guíxols.

In 1916, the Girona industrialist Josep Ensesa i Pujades purchased a plot of land in between the beaches of Sant Pol and Sa Conca, near the mouth of a stream called Es Garó. His initial plan was to build a summer house, but he bought more land around it to make more plots, and thus the project to develop the area was born. The new area didn't have a name, so the family chose to call it after the stream that ran through it.

However, at least in part due to the disruption caused by the First World War, the plan did not initially prosper. After the war, Josep Ensesa i Gubert, the son of Josep Ensesa i Pujades, built the first house on the plot, called Senya Blanca and completed in 1924, entrusting the design to the architect Rafael Masó i Valentí. The house had neither electricity nor running water. More land was then bought, and the whole development entrusted to Masó, who was inspired by the ideas of the garden city movement of the time. Specifically, it is known the Masó had visited the garden city of Hellerau, near Dresden, in 1912.

It was Masó's role to assure that the development, which was planned as a community of seaside villas and a small inn, would be in sympathy with the landscape. Masó was a campaigner for traditional Catalan design, and he drew on the local architectural vocabulary of porticos, towers, terraces and low rooflines to conjure a colony aimed at those with artistic tastes. Purchasers of land bound themselves to carefully drawn contracts that guaranteed buildings of visual unity. After Masó's death, in 1935, Francesc Folguera took over the project, going on to build the church situated on the highest point of the resort.

Although originally built by Masó as a dwelling and soon after converted to a hotel, the current Hostal de la Gavina is largely the work of Folguera. Since the early 1950s famous Hollywood movies like Pandora and the Flying Dutchman with Ava Gardner, Suddenly Last Summer with Elizabeth Taylor and Mr. Arkadin by Orson Welles were shot in S'Agaró. This made the Hostal de La Gavina a meeting place of many famous film stars, musicians, political figures and Nobel Prize winners. The beach scenes in the movie Mysterious Island (1961) were filmed at S'Agaró.

Michael Frayn, the English comic writer, devoted a number of pieces about the developers of S'Agaro and their vision in The Guardian between 1960 and 1962, collected in The Original Michael Frayn.

A huge construction boom took place inland from the original resort, which does not form part of the gated community.

More information: Visit Guíxols

The three great elemental sounds 

in nature are the sound of rain, 

the sound of wind in a primeval wood,

and the sound of outer ocean on a beach.

Henry Beston

VISITING THE MONASTERY OF SANT FELIU DE GUÍXOLS

Today, Claire Fontaine and The Grandma have visited Sant Pol and the Monastery of Sant Feliu de Guíxols in El Baix Empordà, Girona.

Monestir de Sant Feliu de Guíxols is a Benedictine monastery in Sant Feliu de Guíxols, in the comarca of the Baix Empordà in Catalonia. 

It was first referenced around the year 961, and was declared a Bé d'Interès Cultural landmark in 1931.

The Romanesque building is an excellent example of the town's medieval architecture and has been remodeled several times. It includes the Porta Ferrada, the symbol of the town, as well as two towers. It houses a history museum.

On the basis of available records, the foundation of the Benedictine monastery can be traced back to the first half of the 10th century.

The bay of Guixols was chosen due to its good natural harbour and the proximity to the coast of the nearby range of hills, which would make it easier to flee and would give a certain degree of protection in cases of attack from the sea. The decision was no doubt also influenced by the martyrdom of Saint Felix of Africa and the opportunity to take advantage of existing buildings dating from the Roman period.

The monastery's role was to control the agricultural exploitation and production of the surrounding region, and also to provide protection to its inhabitants in return. It was thus a fortified coastal monastery exercising its feudal dominion over the territory. At its foundation, the monastery was dedicated to Saint Felix and the name of Sant Feliu, in its Catalan form, was thereafter forever associated with that of Guíxols, thus giving the present-day name of the town, used from the 10th century onwards.

More information: Museu d'Història Sant Feliu de Guíxols

The Benedictines, officially the Order of Saint Benedict, in Latin Ordo Sancti Benedicti, abbreviated as O.S.B. or OSB, are a mainly contemplative monastic order of the Catholic Church for men and for women who follow the Rule of Saint Benedict. 

Initiated in 529 they are the oldest of all the religious orders in the Latin Church.

The male religious are also sometimes called the Black Monks, especially in English speaking countries, after the colour of their habits. Not all Benedictines wear black however, with some like the Olivetans wearing white.

They were founded by Benedict of Nursia, a 6th-century Italian monk who laid the foundations of Benedictine monasticism through the formulation of his Rule. 

Benedict's sister, Scholastica, possibly his twin, also became a religious from an early age, but chose to live as a hermit. They retained a close relationship until her death.

Despite being called an order, the Benedictines do not operate under a single hierarchy but are instead organized as a collection of autonomous monasteries and convents, some known as abbeys. The order is represented internationally by the Benedictine Confederation, an organization set up in 1893 to represent the order's shared interests. They do not have a superior general or motherhouse with universal jurisdiction but elect an Abbot Primate to represent themselves to the Vatican and to the world.

Benedictine nuns are given the title Dame in preference to Sister.

More information: OSB

Be careful to be gentle,
lest in removing the rust,
you break the whole instrument.

Benedict of Nursia