Logbook · 8 places

What to see and do in Sant Cugat del Vallès

What to see and do in Sant Cugat del Vallès (Vallès Occidental, Barcelona): 8 places across monuments, nature, activities and curiosities, with a photo and a Google Maps location.

1 Villages · 3 Monuments · 1 Nature · 1 Activities · 1 Historical milestones · 1 Food and drink

When to go to Sant Cugat del Vallès: festival calendar

June: Sant Cugat Main Festival (June 25-29)

How far each place is from the centre of Sant Cugat del Vallès

Towns near Sant Cugat del Vallès

What to see in Badia del Vallès 4.5 km · 2 places
What to see in Rubí 4.9 km · 6 places
What to see in Cerdanyola del Vallès 4.9 km · 7 places
What to see in Barberà del Vallès 5.8 km · 4 places
What to see in Ripollet 6.2 km · 3 places
What to see in Sant Quirze del Vallès 6.3 km · 3 places
What to see in el Papiol 7.3 km · 2 places
What to see in Sabadell 8.5 km · 18 places

Spain › Catalonia › Barcelona › Vallès Occidental › Sant Cugat del Vallès

What to see and do in Sant Cugat del Vallès

Sant Cugat del Vallès
Village
Sant Cugat del Vallès is a town in the comarca of Vallès Occidental, in the province of Barcelona, which grew up around the great Benedictine monastery of Sant Cugat, one of the most important in Catalonia. With 97,983 inhabitants (INE 2025), it is the third most populous municipality in the comarca and the eighth in the province. Around the 4th century there was a Roman fortress on the site, the Castrum Octavianum, which protected the crossing of the Via Augusta with the road linking Terrassa and Barcelona; Christian tradition places here the martyrdom, in the year 313, of Cucufat, who had come from Africa to preach. The monastery was built in the 9th century and gave impetus to the medieval village, which kept a rural character until the arrival of the railway in 1917, when summer houses began to be built.
Monastery of Sant Cugat
Monument
The Monastery of Sant Cugat del Vallès is a former Benedictine abbey that gives its name and origin to the city, raised over the remains of a Roman stronghold known as Castrum Octavianum and of a paleo-Christian basilica linked to the cult of the martyr Saint Cugat. The complex, declared a cultural asset of national interest, comprises the church, the cloister and other rooms, today part of the Museu de Sant Cugat. The church, with a basilical plan of three naves and three apses, was begun in Romanesque style and completed in Gothic, with a 13th-century lantern tower. The Romanesque cloister, from the 12th century, holds 144 capitals and preserves an inscription signed by the sculptor Arnau Cadell.
Bridge of Can Vernet
Monument
The Pont de Can Vernet is part of a three-kilometre Gothic aqueduct probably built in the 14th century with stone from Campanyà, which carried water from the Mina dels Monjos, at Can Vullpalleres, to the monastery of Sant Cugat and the lower part of the town. Formed by three round arches over the Torrent de Can Cornellera, it conducted water through a slab-covered channel to a cistern in the abbot's palace, and served the population until 1922. With the disentailment of 1835 it became municipal property; declared a cultural asset of national interest in 1979, it was restored in 1998 and rehabilitated as a pedestrian footbridge. A popular legend tells that the devil built it in a single night in exchange for the soul of the first being to cross it.
Castle of Canals
Monument
The castle of Canals stood in the old quadra of Canals, also called Canalsroges, to the west of Valldoreix, joined in the 19th century to the municipality of Sant Cugat del Vallès. The place name is documented from the year 986, in the exchange of a plot of land, and refers to the reddish colour of the soil there. In the 13th century the castle, by then in ruins, passed from the Cervelló family to the monastery of Sant Cugat del Vallès, whose abbots thereafter held the title of Baron of Canals. The centre of the district was the now-vanished church of Sant Martí de Bosquerons. During the 19th century, after the suppression of jurisdictional lordships, Canals came to have its own town council and belonged to the judicial district of Sant Feliu de Llobregat.
Riera of Sant Cugat
Nature
The riera de Sant Cugat is formed by the union of several streams flowing down from the Serra de Collserola, at an altitude of between 300 and 350 metres, within the municipality of Sant Cugat del Vallès, and takes its official name at the height of the Pollancreda park. With a course of about 14 km, it then crosses the municipalities of Cerdanyola del Vallès and Montcada i Reixac, where it flows into the river Ripoll shortly before the latter empties into the Besòs; its basin, of about 50 km², belongs to the Mediterranean watershed and also receives the waters of the Serra dels Galliners. No point along its course lies more than 10 km from Barcelona.
Sant Cugat Main Festival
Activity
The Festa Major of Sant Cugat is celebrated around 29 June, the feast of Sant Pere, patron of the parish of the Sant Cugat district and co-patron of the city; it includes the dawn "albades" performed by bagpipers and drummers, the procession of Sant Pere, the dance of "Paga-li, Joan" and the gathering of giants.
Exclaustration of the Benedictine monastery
Historical milestone
The disentailment law of 1835 obliged the Benedictine community to abandon the monastery, which from then on served as parish church, school and even Guardia Civil barracks. In 1931 it was declared a historic monument and its restoration began.
Wine Cooperative of Sant Cugat
Food and drink
The vine progressively replaced the cereals in the nineteenth century until phylloxera arrived in 1887. The wine cooperative, the work of Cèsar Martinell in 1921 with parabolic arches of exposed brick, recalls that wine-growing past in the middle of the town centre.