Vallbona de les Monges Voyage Tips and guide

Vallbona de les Monges is in Lleida (province). In the town there is the most important female cistercenc monastery in Catalonia: Santa Maria de Vallbona, and together with the Monestir of Poblet and the Monestir of Santes Creus they make up the Cistercian Route.

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Map of Vallbona de les Monges

Vallbona de les Monges is in the south of the Urgell county, about 25 km from the capital, Tàrrega, in one of the valleys between the Serra del Tallat and the Vall del Corb, just at the provincial limit of the Terres de Lleida and the Camp de Tarragona. Dry stone huts, cereal fields , vineyards, almond tree and olive tree fields predominate the landscape. The founder of the town of Vallbona de les Monges was an abbess of the monastery, Estefania de Piquer who, in order to avoid the agreements of the Council of Trent which stipulated that female monasteries could not be located in uninhabited places or outside the walls, made a donation of the lands and buildings around the monastery. In this way the town was born and the first mayor was appointed in 1573.

• 41.5251141.0880561 Tourist office (Oficina de turisme), C. Prat de la Riba, 6, ☏ +34 973 982 500, [email protected].  (updated Jan 2026)

• From Barcelona
  • is 140 km (87 mi) away. Follow direction Lleida by  B-23 ,  AP-7  ,  AP-2  motorway exit  Montblanc↗️   then  C-14  direction Tàrrega and  LP-2353 
• From Tarragona
  • is 60 km (37 mi) away. Follow direction Lleida by  A-27  then  C-14  direction Tàrrega and  LP-2353 
• From Lleida
  • is 53 km (33 mi) away. Follow direction Barcelona by  A-2  until Bellpuig and then  LP-2015  ,  LV-2014   and  LP-2353 .

• GR-175 Ruta del Cister: route that links together the three Cistercian monasteries of Santes Creus, Poblet and Vallbona.

Small enough to walk.

• 41.5239151.0878531 Parking municipal carrer Muralla. Free.  (updated Dec 2025)
• 41.526661.0882442 Parking municipal Piscines.  (updated Dec 2025)
• 41.5267381.087443 Motorhome area (Àrea autocaravanes Vallbona de les Monges). Max 48h,  (updated Dec 2025)

• 41.5246061.0882891 Nuns Monastery of Santa Maria de Vallbona (Santa Maria de Vallbona de les Monges), C/Major s/n, ☏ +34 973 33 02 66, [email protected]. There are guided visits, but only in Catalan and Spanish. Check hours in the web, as times vary according Nuns requirements. €8.  (updated Dec 2025)
  • History: is a 12th‑century female Cistercian monastery that evolved from an earlier mixed community of hermits following the Benedictine rule. Around 1153, the charismatic hermit Ramon de Vallbona gathered anchorites in the valley, laying the foundations of a cenobitic settlement later endowed with lands by Ramon Berenguer IV, count of Barcelona, in 1163. By 1175 the male hermits had departed and a stable community of nuns chose full incorporation into the Cistercian Order, receiving their first abbess, Oria Ramírez of Tulebras, the following year. Royal favour from Alfonso II and later kings of the Crown of Aragon turned Vallbona into the most important female Cistercian house in Catalonia and a spiritual and cultural centre linked to the great Cistercian axis of Poblet and Santes Creus. Between the 12th and 14th centuries the community built the church, cloister and conventual buildings, combining Romanesque and Gothic forms that still define its architecture. Despite later crises and reforms, including those prompted by the Council of Trent, the monastery has remained continuously inhabited by nuns for more than 850 years, preserving its liturgical and contemplative tradition into the present.
  • The church is a 12th–13th century Cistercian temple with a Latin cross ground plan, a single nave covered by pointed barrel vaulting and a transept that supports an elegant octagonal dome. Its architecture fuses late Romanesque solidity with early Gothic verticality, visible in the ribbed vaults and slender windows of the polygonal apse. A restrained sculptural program, with capitals and portals decorated by vegetal motifs, reflects Cistercian ideals of simplicity and sobriety. Light, filtered through narrow openings, creates a contemplative atmosphere suited to monastic liturgy.

    

  • The royal tombs underscore the monastery’s status as a favored burial site of the Crown of Aragon, especially for female members. Most notable are the Gothic sepulchres of Queen Violant of Hungary, wife of James I the Conqueror, and their daughter, which rest in the church. Their recumbent effigies, sheltered beneath richly carved arcosolia along the nave, combine dynastic representation with Cistercian austerity. These monuments transformed Vallbona into a dynastic memorial space, linking the community of nuns to the political and spiritual life of medieval Catalonia and the wider Crown.
  • The cloister is the spatial and symbolic heart of the monastery, organizing community life around a serene, enclosed garden. Built between the 12th and 14th centuries, it displays an unusual mix of rounded Romanesque and pointed Gothic arches, supported by paired columns with finely carved capitals. The four galleries connect the principal spaces—church, chapter house, dormitory and refectory—embodying Cistercian ideals of order and harmony. Its silent arcades, framing controlled vistas of sky and stone, function as a space for meditation, reading and processions within the monastic rhythm.
  • The rest of the monastery comprises the essential conventual buildings that sustained a self‑contained female Cistercian community for centuries. The chapter house hosted daily meetings and the reading of the rule, while the dormitory, refectory, kitchens, cellars and infirmary organized communal living and work. Later additions, such as guest quarters and service areas, reflect evolving needs and periods of reform without breaking the overall architectural coherence. Together, these spaces illustrate the economic, spiritual and social structures that allowed Vallbona to remain a living monastic centre into the modern era.

• 41.5247621.0888722 Parish Church Of Santa Maria.  (updated Dec 2025)
• 41.5055731.1192563 Castell de Montesquiu. ruins of a castle.  (updated Dec 2025)
• 41.5252541.0881314 Cinema museum (Espai Museístic Del Cinema - Col·Lecció Josep Maria Queraltó), Prat de la Riba 6, ☏ +34 973 982 500. museum space in Lleida where more than a hundred objects related to the world of cinema and audiovisual from its beginnings to the digital age are exhibited, within the collection of Mr. Josep Maria Queraltó.  (updated Dec 2025)
• 41.5253611.0877085 Old Laundry Houses and Font Del Raval. Laundries dating from 1923, restored around 2017, next to the fountain that collects the water from the mine, very close to the orchards near the stream and next to the walls of the monastery orchard.All in a secluded space, under a pine forest that must be visited to finish the visit to the town.  (updated Dec 2025)
• 41.5257261.0869526 Espai Maldanell, Carrer de Sant Bernat 2. On the ground floor of the building, which has been completely restored, there is a recreation of what it used to be: the old oil mill of the village cooperative. In addition, there is a corner dedicated to nature, biodiversity, dry stone art, and the birdlife of the Maldanell Valley and the Serra del Tallat, where the town of Vallbona is nestled.  (updated Jan 2026)

• Festival of the Pigota : Last Saturday of January
• Sant Isidre: May 15
• VALLBONATURA Fair: in May
• Cultural and Leisure days : 1st fortnight of August
• Festa Major in honor of the patron saints SANT COSME AND SANT DAMIÀ: 3rd weekend of September

• 41.5251321.0881771 agrobotiga, Prat de la Riba, 3,, ☏ +34 973 330 260. shop with local products: olive oil , local wine, honey,...  (updated Jan 2026)

• 41.525331.0880161 Restaurant Cister de Vallbona, Carrer de Prat de la Riba, 8, ☏ +34 676 559 539, [email protected]. from €18.  (updated Jan 2026)

• L’Hostatgeria del Monestir, ☏ +34 618 876 004, [email protected]. The hostel is equipped with a lift and consists of 20 single or double rooms,a chapel,2 rooms,the Sant Bernat Shelter for groups of young people (24 places) (updated Dec 2025)

• Royal Monastery of Santa Maria de Poblet in Poblet Natural Park , It is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and one of the most significant Cistercian monasteries in Europe. It's part of "Cister route".
• Santes Creus monastery ("Holy crosses monastery") , which is part of Cister Route.
• Valls Known by the Castells (human towers) and the Calçotada food.
• Montblanc, An still walled 12th century city, with nice downtown and intersting jewish quarter. It's also a gateway to the Cistercian Route and the scenic Prades Mountains. It hosts the annual Medieval Week in April,