Parador de Cardona
Cardona
Medieval fortress with legend of love
The Parador de Cardona is located in the small town of Cardona, built in the 9th century. It is a medieval fortress overlooking the town of Cardona, which is less than an hour inland from Barcelona and less than 30 minutes from Montserrat.
The sturdy stone fortress has been converted into a parador and its centrepiece is a huge chimney-style tower, the Torre de la Minyona. You can climb up the steep stairs to the tower, which is more than 10 metres high. From this huge tower you can see the desolate landscape of the distant mountain ranges. If you look closely, you can see a salt mountain made entirely of rock salt in the valley of Salado.
Once you've passed the tower and the fountain at the entrance to the castle, you'll come to the church of San Vicente. It is located along the walls and corridors of the square courtyard, which have peach-shaped arches that appear at various points. There is also a terrace with open views.
Today it is just a small rural village. But if you look at the steep ramparts and the towers piled up on the hills, you can see that it was a strategic fortress at the forefront of Catalonia. Furthermore, it seems that the Duke of the House of Aragon owned the castle and kept renovating it to maintain its majestic appearance.
The Parador also has a restaurant that serves traditional Catalan cuisine, and given that the Parador is located on a hill and is a little far from the city centre, it's a good idea to dine at the Parador Restaurant while you're staying.
Dinner is served in a cosy restaurant with a vaulted stone ceiling, where you can choose between a menu with a starter, main course and dessert, or a traditional menu that is unique to Cardona. Simple dishes such as butifarra, a traditional Catalan sausage served with beans, and jamon croquettes are also available.
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This castle is said to have been involved in many wars and stories, the most famous of which is the legend that when the daughter of the castle's owner fell in love with a Moorish warrior during the 11th century, when Christians and Moors were at war, her parents locked her up in the tower, La Torre de la Minyona (The Tower of the Little Lady)
