Village
Flix is a town in the Ribera d'Ebre, in Tarragona, settled on a bend of the Ebro that gives it its name and with 3,340 inhabitants. It has a reservoir dating from 1940, a hydroelectric power station and a chemical industrial estate, as well as the remains of a medieval castle, a new castle from the Carlist Wars and the late Gothic church of the Virgin of the Assumption. It was one of the last strongholds of the Republican People's Army during the Battle of the Ebro: in the early hours of 16 November 1938 the troops of Lieutenant Colonel Manuel Tagüeña crossed the river here, putting an end to 115 days of fighting. On the left bank, two monoliths recall the fallen and the Pont de Ferro (Iron Bridge), blown up after the Republican retreat. The town is also home to the Sebes Nature Reserve.
Monument
A 19th-century castle overlooking the town of Flix, in the Ribera d'Ebre. The site has been documented since the 12th century, when in 1150 it was conquered by Ramon Berenguer IV, and throughout the Middle Ages it passed through different lords until Barcelona bought the barony in 1398. The current fortification, the Castell Nou, was built in 1837 during the First Carlist War under the command of Ramón Cabrera: with an irregular floor plan, three circular towers and battered walls, it follows the Vauban-type fortification model. Occupied by Liberal troops in 1875, it was later left abandoned until it was restored between 2009 and 2010, work that was awarded prizes in 2012 and 2014. Today it is visited via a metal walkway that gives access to the towers.
Nature
The Sebes and Meander of Flix Wildlife Nature Reserve, in the Ribera d'Ebre (Tarragona), comprises two river areas declared a nature reserve in 1995. The Sebes area, covering 204 hectares, lies on the left bank of the Ebro, upstream of the Flix reservoir, and preserves one of the most extensive reed beds in Catalonia together with an almost untouched riverside forest growing on the river islands; the meander stretches for almost five kilometres and includes a former river island beneath Flix castle. Since 1999 it has had an information centre, the Mas del Director, and wooden walkways giving access to the reed bed and the riverside forest. A project to reintroduce the white stork has been under way since 2001.
Activity
The main festival of Flix, in the Ribera d'Ebre (Tarragona), is celebrated on 15 August. Among its events, the river festival stands out, with a race of puntons (traditional boats) on the Ebro, which gives the celebration a distinctive character linked to the town's river-based trade.
Monument
The assut de Flix is an old weir on the Ebro river, of Saracen origin and medieval period, built in stone, which crossed the river diagonally. A hydroelectric power station, inaugurated in 1948, was built on its site, at the same point that later remained linked to the town's former electrochemical complex.
Nature
The Illa de Sapos is part of the meander formed by the Ebro river as it passes through Flix, in the Ribera d'Ebre, a space environmentally restored after decades of industrial activity. It is part of the Sebes Nature Reserve, declared in 1995 with 204 hectares, which brings together the Sebes wetland and the meander itself and is the second most important wetland in Tarragona. It preserves one of the most extensive reed beds in Catalonia and an almost intact riverside forest on its river islands. Since 2001 a programme for the reintroduction of the white stork has been underway, with Camargue horses grazing to keep the habitat open, and it has walkways, observation points and interpretation centres, among them Mas de Pitoia, dedicated to traditional river transport.
Nature
Large meander of the Ebro located downstream of the Flix reservoir, one of the most pronounced on the river, which forms part, together with the Sebes and Riba-roja meander, of a wetland complex almost five kilometres long that includes an old river island beneath the Castell de Flix, partly declared a nature reserve. Flow regulation means it functions for much of the year almost like an abandoned meander, with strong and sudden level swings. It preserves communities of reed beds, tamarisk and riverside poplar woods in good condition, and is home to the mollusc Margaritifera auricularia, extinct in the rest of Europe and surviving only in the Ebro. Among its fauna are the black kite, the kestrel, the marsh harrier, a colony of sand martins and a small population of otters.
Monument
Centre devoted to the industrial and natural memory of Flix and the Ribera d'Ebre.
Historical milestone
In 1897, German capital from the company Chemische Fabrik Electron set up the Sociedad Electroquímica de Flix next to a meander of the Ebro, making use of an old weir to produce, by means of its own hydroelectric plant, potassium chlorate, calcium hypochlorite and sodium sulphide destined largely for export. The plant turned a farming village into an industrial colony, the Colonia de la Fábrica, with its own housing, school and company store. In 1925 it became part of the German consortium IG Farben; taken over by the Spanish State after the German defeat in 1945, in 1951 it was acquired in majority by the Spanish company Cros, which ended up absorbing it in 1973 under the name Electroquímica de Flix.
Historical milestone
A century of discharges from the factory left hundreds of thousands of tonnes of sludge with heavy metals and organochlorine compounds on the bed of the reservoir. Its extraction and confinement was one of the greatest environmental works in the country.