Walking in the Priorat, Southern Catalonia

The tourism department have this year produced a set of  10 leaflets of walking routes around the Priorat.  What’s more they are available in English, French, Spanish and Catalan.  You may not think this is very exciting but when we first came here the only information we could obtain about walking routes in the Priorat was typed and photocopied on A4 paper, in Catalan – and poorly described at that!

The new leaflets are professionally printed and are a neat pocket-size with generally good descriptions (if occasionally a little brief), a basic map outline of the route and a couple of paragraphs about the area.  A lot of work has been done around the region clearing old walking routes and pack-horse trails between villages which combined with the European Hiking Network (GR routes) now work together to offer some superb hiking around this stunning region. The routes are also available in GPS form.

The routes cater for different abilities and are classed as follows:
4 are classed as easy/suitable for families with children with lengths from 3 to 7.5 km.
2 are classed as moderate hikes – 5km and 11km
3 are classed as demanding – 12 -18.5 km and with ascents of up to 990m

Southern Catalonia has not previously been a well known area for taking a walking holiday. It’s always been a mystery to us why it was not better promoted but now it seems things are on the up! With these new leaflets and the Cicerone book with 30 routes in the Els Ports area (released a year ago) you now have lots of choice in the mountain ranges on both sides of our valley!

Perhaps we’ll see you soon at River Ebro Apartments!

Click the following links for our experiences of some of these walks.

The Soul of Montsant (Congost of Fraguerau)