Sant Climent de Peralta

How to arrive?

The village of Sant Climent de Peralta originates from the old monastery located in a small, narrow valley of Les Gavarres, in the vicinity of the tramuntana. No so long ago - 18th C. - the church of the old monastery was abandoned and the new parish was built, about two kilometres to the east, in the nature reserves of the mountain range closest to the plain, where the population of country houses moved to, characterising the location. Sant Climent had to be, as Pella and Forgas indicated, one of the first monastic, Benedictine colonisations of the country.

The monastery was placed in a hidden corner, in the valley of a ridge with slopes staggered over cultivated terraces and near to a fountain, which has now almost stopped. Lets imagine that in the high-medieval era the place would have been even more shady and would have had more scrambling vegetation than at present. It seems that this site was populated before the monastic establishment. The tiles that can be seen between the walls of the church ruins may come from a building from Roman times. However, remains of a necropolis with tombs protected with tegula have been discovered that could be prior to the first documents that tell us about the monastic cell.

The ruins of the church of the monastery of Sant Climent de Peralta are known by the name of the old church of Mas Vidal, a 19th century house, that is currently inhabited. This was to be built with most of the stones from the demolition of part of the church, and perhaps from other medieval buildings that had disappeared.

The inhabitants of Sant Climent de Peralta have traditionally been living from the fields and the exploitation of the natural resources of the Gavarres massif: cork, firewood, coal, etc ... The town farmhouses thrived with the exploitation of cork. Then, when the vines in France were attacked by phylloxera, much of the farmland was transformed into vineyards. Currently, the settlement is made up of dozens of farms, some of them converted into second homes.

Sant Climent de Peralta's church

La Carbonera

La Rajoleria del Mas Frigola

Festa del segar i del batre

In Sant Climent, however, it is still possible to breathe the atmosphere belonging to a place that is closely linked to the massif. The village has some of the most beautiful and enchanting places of the Gavarres, which make it an excellent place for hiking and discovering the natural environment of this important space.