Montserrat Private Tour, Cable Car & Picnic by Train

We recommend walking the path to St. Michael's Cross. It's only uphill in one direction!

Pau was a great guide. His familiarity with the area and the people provided us with an insider's view of the site. We recommend walking the path to St. Michael's Cross. It's only uphill in one direction!

Would do again

Wonderful trip to Monserrat. I would definitely do it again. Pau, our guide, was fantastic. He is a local who absolutely knows his way around and is friendly with all of the right people on the trip. Very knowledgeable and extremely helpful. He knew all there was to know and wasn’t the least bit bored with a tour I’m sure he has given countless times

Pau was an excellent...

Pau was an excellent guide. He definitely tailored the experience to what we were able to do, offering alternatives at different points. I had been wanting to go to Montserrat and his expertise added to my enjoyment.

Wonderful Day in Montserrat

Great trip. Our guide was able to get us in everywhere, and offered a great personal experience. I loved getting up close to the Black Madonna. Spectacular!

Amazing experience with a...

Amazing experience with a personal guide is worth cost. The trip was seamless and top notch communication and coordination

Great day half day trip out of Barcelona

Our guide Pedro was great and very knowledgeable. He took the anxiety of traveling by public transport and navigating our way to Montserrat easy and enjoyable. Definitely a highlight of our trip. Only knock on this tour, is how it is set up. Would have been worth it, and comparable to other private tours, if the guide accompanied us through the monastery and museum, so he could give further detail and highlights

Not exactly what we thought it would be like...

A visit to Montserrat seemed like a wonderful idea, especially since three of the four of us had already been to Barcelona in the past. Paola met us right on time at 10:00 a.m. We went to the station, and he stood in line to buy tickets for the 10:45 train to Montserrat while we waited. By the time we boarded the crowded train, we found the last few seats where the five of us could sit together so Paulo could tell us about Montserrat, Barcelona, and other tidbits about Spain. He seemed quite knowledgeable, but the noise of the train, his accent, and the people standing around us sometimes made it difficult to take in what he was saying. After the one-hour train ride, we stood in line for well over an hour for the gondola to the abbey. There are only two gondolas--one goes up while the other comes down. Each gondola holds over 20 people, and luck of the draw made us the last people to board the cars (both up ad down), requiring us to stand in the middle instead of next to a window where we could enjoy the view and take decent pictures. When we got to the top, we sat on the steps in the square and had a light snack prepared in advance by Paolo. Fortunately, it was a pleasant, sunny day. By the time we had finished eating, it was time for us to visit the church to see the Black Madonna, so we did not have any time to stroll the grounds or visit the gift shop, if there IS a gift shop. Another long line that seemed to take forever, waiting for our turn to see the statue... (The tour did not say that we would have skip-the-line tickets, so this is our fault for not realizing how much time we would waste standing in lines.) The end result of the day is that we met our tour guide in Barcelona at 10:00 a.m. and left him at 3:45 p.m. During those 5+ hours, we had two 5-minute gondola rides, a light snack, 15-30 seconds to actually see the Black Madonna, and time to view the inside of the church. All that time, Paolo must have felt like a babysitter who had to keep us engaged by sharing his knowledge while we waited around. By the time we returned to Barcelona, we were stressed and decided to unwind with sangria before heading to the Sagrada Familia. We enjoyed this so much that we went looking for churros. By the time we found those, it was time to head back to our cruise ship. As a result, I am probably one of the few people who has ever visited Barcelona for a day and not seen even one Gaudi work!

Exceptional Tour

Jennifer, was an extremely lovely, knowledgeable and an exceptional tour guide, Jennifer is definitely passionate about sharing her knowledge of Spain’s history.

Excellent Tour

Our tour guide, Pau, was very kind, energetic, and knowledgeable. The views were amazing and the history of the location was very interesting.

Pau was excellent, highly...

Pau was excellent, highly recommend him as tour guide. He was courteous of our needs, very energetic and knowledgeable of the area. His expertise of Montserrat was enlightening. He was a joy and would like to tour with him again!

Great day.

Our guide was excellent. It was difficult to connect with the guide at first. Meeting place crowded. It was a holiday, and lines were long, so we did not get to see everything that was planned, but it was still a great day. Tour guide awesome! Marketplace nice feature.

Magical Montserrat

The MOST memorable experience, if you are able to request for Pau, do not hesitate. My husband and I enjoyed his wealth of knowledge, wit, and general love of Montserrat and his country. There really was no question he couldn't answer, historical and philosophical. Montserrat is a spiritual pilgrimage regardless of your religious denomination, and Pau took care of us every step of the way. The cable car ride was breathtaking and the sandwich lunch from Pavet was top notch! We hope to link up again in the future for his other tours. Book this experience and ask for Pau, you will not be disappointed!!

Good trip

Sharri, our guide, was personable, professionable and knowledgeable and a pleasure to be with. However, in terms of the substance of the trip, I would have to say that the amount paid was more than the value added by having it personalized. That is NO criticism of her - just that the trip itself, including the content, could easily have been done on one's own for far lower cost,

Great Tour with Excellent Guide.

We just finished this private tour with Pau as our guide. He is excellent and we highly recommend asking for him by name. He is extremely knowledgeable about Monserrat and Catalonia but more importantly he is personable and fun to spend the day with. Karen K.

Tour guide better then the tour itself

The tour guide was amazing however the tour was not what we signed up for! I give her 4+ stars but the train tracks were broken, and it was very hot to have to switch around a lot to get there. Was very expensive for what we got.

We had the best time at...

We had the best time at Montserrat! Pau was beyond great, he was so knowledgeable, ask questions to get to know us so he could make the trip more about what we want to know and see. I took his time explaining different thing and pointing out thing to make sure we did not miss anything. I was so worth the money and I would so do another Viator guide trip again. Thank you for the wonderful experience!

An amazing experience

Pau was an amazing guide. So friendly and interacted so well with the family and kids. He really made the whole experience memorable. We learned so much from him about the history and Catalonian culture.

Montserrat was spectacular!!!

Our guide Pau was terrific. We enjoyed the trip to Montserrat immensely. Our 14 year old grandson also had a great time. We even had an added bonus of viewing a wedding while we were ther.

The Full Experience

The meeting place, Catalonia Hotel was easy to find. Our guide Vicenta met us there and took us to the station where she purchase the tickets (included). Once at the site we stopped by the open air market and sampled cheeses and other products. She guided us around the area and then we went to the monastery. The church was beautiful and we were allowed to go up stairs to see the Black Madonna and child. Very ornate and beautiful. We then hiked up to the cross and took in the view. From there you could see where Spain meets France. She brought a sandwich, some pears and water. We shared some dried figs from the market. A delightful day with a absolutely engaging and fun hostess. Vicenta is delightful!

Pau the Best!

We recommend Pau to everyone. He is entertaining and really kept us interested in the history of Spain and Montserrat. Montserrat everyone should experience. Thanks again Pau. From the Grazas of 8. 6/19/2023

Pau is a wonderful guide

Pau is a wonderful and knowledgeable guide. We had an incredibly memorable experience. I cannot recommend him any higher!

WONDERFUL TOUR. LOVE PAU, our guide.

Pau, our guide, was excellent. Very knowledgeable and the pace was perfect. We would highly recommend tours by local (I’ve used tours by locals many times) for this trip!

Great way to see Montserrat

This tour was just me, my husband and the tour guide which was great and a surprise to us! It was nice to travel by train with a guide. The cable car is a must if you go to Montserrat! The tour guide was fine, there was a last minute switch because our original tour guide was sick. Would definitely recommend this way of seeing Montserrat!

Visit Montserrat on your own!

It is difficult to give a rating for our experience. Three says “average” though so I went with two as it said “poor”. It is probably somewhere in between. If you want the bottom line up front - Don’t book this trip. For €47 per person on the visit Montserrat website you can book roundtrip train tickets from Barcelona, cable car fare, museum, entrance with headset, Black Madonna viewing, church access, and boy’s choir tickets. Leave on the 0930 train and plan to return on the 1615 train. There are no train transfers for this trip and everyone is very helpful in getting you where you need to be. Once at Montserrat, the Visitor Center is very nice and everything is well labeled with signs. So, now into why I rated this experience as a two. We were originally contacted by Pau who was supposed to be our guide, but the day before the trip, we were contacted by Sharon stating that she was going to be our guide now. She had some poor reviews, but it was one day before the trip and too late to cancel, so we decided to just continue with our plans. I figured maybe people wrote poor reviews because they didn’t engage with her, and wanted to give her the benefit of the doubt. We met Sharon, at 1000, as instructed and after she purchased the train tickets from the kiosk, we boarded the 1030 train. It is an hour to Montserrat and I wrongfully assumed it would be time spent discussing the history of Montserrat and developing a plan for arrival. It wasn’t. Sharon barely spoke during the ride. She brought no material to review or read ahead. I have been on many tours in many countries and they always have picture books or handouts or something. She had nothing. Additionally, she seated us in the section for disabled/ handicapped individuals, so my husband had to give up his seat when an elderly woman boarded the train. Once arrived, we waited in line for the cable car while she went to purchase the tickets for the trip up and back as those were also not pre-purchased. We were lucky to have been the last people on the first car following our arrival and were at the top at approximately 10 minutes until 1200. Two hours already gone! During the train ride, I asked Sharon about the choir and she informed me it was not part of the package, so we went to the visitor center to see if we were able to get tickets. This would have been an additional cost, but they were sold out. Sharon apologized and said it used to be included, but there had been many changes recently to the processes at Montserrat. She informed us that our entrance tickets to see the Black Madonna was at 1330, so we elected to go see the Cross of St Michael. It was a brisk 30 minute walk to/ from the cross, which was the ONLY time we were with Sharon at Montserrat. I asked her MANY questions about the site and most of her answers were “I don’t know”. They weren’t obscure questions - they were about the original builders, architects, statues around the site. She didn’t even tell is the Madonna statue wasn’t the original statue found in the cave. It is actually from the 12th century as the original was “lost”. When we got back from seeing the cross, we ate our lunch and there was no time to purchase anything from the restaurant. We then went to the entrance and found out there were two separate lines as the choir was just letting out and there were tons of people trying to get in at the same time. We originally were in the line to enter the church, but my daughter asked a couple questions about the lines and Sharon finally suggested we get in the line to see the Madonna first. She informed us she would not be going with us inside and air dropped the tickets to my daughter’s phone and told us where she would meet us afterwards. We switched lines and waited in like for nearly an hour to see the Madonna. We then entered the church without waiting in line again (if we had done it in reverse order, we would have ran out of time as the line for the Madonna had doubled in size). There were many other guides inside the church discussing its history and pointing out features, but we were left to wander on our own. Sharon provided no guidance before leaving us other than where to meet her afterwards, so it was a quick walk thru and we went outside. She then informed us we needed to head back down to the cablecar by 1445, so we had to hurry to the market and gift shop as it was already 1430. We went on the cable car and waited at the train station for the 1515 train and was back in Barcelona at roughly 1615. Sharon assisted in getting us back to where we started and left. So, now that I detailed the entire experience, I want to add a few additional comments. Technically, we got EXACTLY what we paid for. Someone escorted us to the site, we went to the 2 things included in the ticket, and she got us back to the start point. Sharon was very nice and knew where to go for the train and the tickets. The sandwich and water were provided and the total time was 6 hours. The problem is, there is nearly 3.5 hours of travel time built into that so you ONLY have about 2.5 hours to do everything include eat. We walked very quickly to the cross and back as we have no mobility issues, ate our lunch in about 15 minutes, and didn’t really do any shopping. It was nowhere near enough time. We will never return to Montserrat and would have enjoyed the museum, the cave, the choir, and additional time to really look around in the multiple, very nice gift shops around Montserrat. This tour should be for 8 hours because with the additional time, we could have done all the things we wanted to do there. If, however, your only goal is to see the Black Madonna and you don’t want to have the guide tell you any history of Montserrat, this may be the ideal tour for you. Otherwise, this one is DEFINITELY one you can do on your own. Save the tour money for the Flamenco show, Guell Park, and La Sagrada Familia. All tours we did with Viator and the rest were worth every penny. This one just disappointed us immensely and I wish to save others from the extravagant cost for something they will be unhappy with. Even if we had a better guide, the time is just too short to have a positive experience with the “summertime tourists” as the lines are long and a lot of the 2.5 hours is eaten up waiting in queue.

Amazing Monserrat!!

Definitely a must see near Barcelona! Easy train access & cable car scary but really fun! Our guide Pedro was amazing & made sure we enjoyed the experience. Go before 1pm to hear the boy’s choir.. so majestic & well worth the trip!

Magnificent Montserrat

I never felt as small as I did when I saw the magnificent mountains and the cable car ride up to Montserrat. It was breathtaking. I’ve never seen anything like that before in my life. I would highly recommend it to anybody that is thinking of coming to Spain. Do not miss this. I’ll never forget it.

Out of Barcelona - Montserrat Monastry and Local Market Tour

Our half day tour included an hour's train ride from Barcelona and another hour back. Nonetheless, the cable car ride up to the monastery itself offered a breathtaking view of the surrounding area. The walking tour at the Montserrat grounds was relaxing and, with the cool mountain air, refreshing. We liked the market next to the monastery, too, where we bought some local cheeses and honey. For the brave, one might take the cogwheel train up to the mountain peak, at extra cost.

Montserrat Experience

Pau was a fantastic guide. We had a wonderful experience. The views and monestery are not to be missed. This is a must do tour.

Memories Made on Monserrat.

An amazing day! Beautiful weather and scenery. A very organized and knowledgeable guide, Paul. He was wonderful.

Must see

So knowledgeable, and sandwiches were great. We all loved Pedro. The cable car ride was fun and safe.

Our tour guide Pau was...

Our tour guide Pau was the best! He was knowledgable about Montserrat history and the region of Catalonia. We totally enjoyed the trip.

Our guide Fred was...

Our guide Fred was extremely knowledgeable and kind. He made the Montserrat experience memorable and enjoyable. We highly recommend the tour.

Great Tour!

Our tour guide was excellent and very knowledgeable about Montserrat. They are also excellent at pointing out wonderful merchants in the market.

One of the best things we did while in Barcelona!

Our tour guide Pao was amazing! He is super knowledgeable and knew all about Barcelona and Montserrat and everything in between. There were five of us in our group including 2 small children (ages 6 and 9). Pao took his time explaining things to the children and was kind. Montserrat is such a beautiful place and is definitely a must see if you are in Barcelona. Having your own personal guide is definitely the way to go. Hopefully you will be lucky enough to get Pao as a guide (ask for him)!

Monserrat is a must see!!

Pau, our tour guide was awesome! He was very knowledgeable and helped guide us to make sure we had more time. Views were amazing! It was our favorite thing to do while staying in Barcelona!!

Best Monserrat tour guide!

My 20 year old son and I spent a week in Barcelona and selected this tour specifically because it was 6 hours and included the metro and cable car. The other tours included other stops but were 12 hours long and we didn’t want to spend a whole day on a tour. Our tour guide Fred was wonderful and guided us through the day with lots of information and patience. We were fortunate to see the boys choir as well. Fred had been monitoring their schedule and we lucked out that they were performing on the day and time of our tour. Fred brought along delicious sandwiches (vegetarian for my son), tea and fruit for our lunch. We sat overlooking the entire valley and had a relaxing lunch before heading back to Barcelona. Fred was also kind enough to help us navigate the metro ticketing system for our future days of travel. He even checked on us the next day to make sure we made our metro trip to the Dali museum successfully. Such a great guy! I’m definitely recommending my friends to Fred! ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Fantastic!

Our tour guide was Frederick and he was amazing!!! Anyone that has Frederick for a guide will have the best trip to Montserrat! I had bought the incorrect metro ticket and Frederick gave me his metro pass to get back to Barcelona. He was the kindest and most helpful guide on our trip.

Fantastic tour experience

Pao did an incredible job with the tour. The alk to the cross on Montersatt as the highlight as we ate our picnic lunch there. We also watched part of the church service and heard the boys choir. The trio included another guide in training and she was equally fantastic. Will tell our friends about our adventure with the tour guides.

Amazing scenery with wonderful tour guide!

Did a sister's trip to Barcelona last week and booked this tour and it was EXCELLENT. We got paired with Jeni and she was so bubbly, enthusiastic and it was obvious she truly loves what she does. We had the best time with her seeing the sights and chatting with her. Felt like she was just one of our other friends hanging with us. It is obvious her love for Barcelona and she was so excited to go to Montserrat despite having gone before. She was very helpful to us and showed us the cheese market, the boys choir in addition to the stuff that was included in the tour. She also gave us restaurant and other things to do recs in Barcelona. Monserrat is absolutely beautiful. Unfortunately when we went the cable car wasn't working so we had to take the train up, however it was still a nice ride. It is a long day and we were gone for 7 hours due to the travel time to get to Montserrat however it is well worth it and I thought the price was reasonable for the tour. The warmness of the country of Spain cannot be under estimated as it is a completely different vibe than France where I felt people look down on tourists. I can't wait to go back and would definitely want to tour with Jeni again!

Worth the time and money

Pedro was an excellent, personable, engaging and knowledgeable guide. He was a pleasure to spend time with and really made the excursion comfortable and easy.

The Guide was so...

The Guide was so informative and helpful, it was a great experience. Gave time for every small detail, we totally had a great time..

Great day with Montserrat tour

Our tour guide Pau was incredible. Had a great experience. Highly informative, fun and organized. Highlight of our stay in Barcelona.

A perfect day

Pau, our guide, was very knowledgeable and interesting. In addition to the learning about Montserrat, we learned a lot about Spanish history and the Spanish Civil War, and he was more than willing to answer any question. we asked him. Montserrat was a wonderful experience, enhanced by the beautiful day. The only disappointment was the boys car was not performing on Christmas day and we were there.

Private Montserrat is the way to go!

Pau was absolutely awesome! We did this tour with my mom and aunt and he really helped us with the mobility issues we had. He was extremely knowledgeable and made sure we got to see everything we wanted to see. I would highly recommend!

Poor tour

For the price of this tour I was expecting our tour guide to have planned more in advance and be more knowledgeable. This was easily the worst tour we went on during our entire trip. Do not recommend.

Private guide is worth it!

Excellent tour. Our guide was exceptional in his knowledge and flexibility to what we were interested in seeing.

Breath taking views

The cable car ride up the mountain was priceless. The view was beautiful. Once we arrived at the top, we continued on to see the monastery. Our guides were great. They were very informative. It was like traveling with friends. They be made us very comfortable. I would highly recommend this tour.

Amazing! Incredibly beautiful and moving experience.

Paul was an incredible guide, so knowledgeable and friendly. He went above and beyond to provide us with a wonderful experience.

Five star and an excellent guide.

Pau was the most excellent tour guide. Knowledgable but super fun and a credit to Viator. I would recommend Pau to other parties wishing a personal tour.

Sharon was a wonderful...

Sharon was a wonderful guide. Would go with her again! Great experience. Hope to take another tour soon.