San Millán is a very small town tucked into the mountains just southwest from Logroño. The town is famous for its twin monasteries - Suso, Yuso, and the ancient chronicles kept by the monks centuries ago. In these annals arose ¨the origin of the Spanish, and Basque language¨. We were given a guided tour throughout the monastery, and learned about art, architecture, and history as presented by a very determined and serious young man named Francisco, or Jose-Luis, or Jaime, I don´t really remember.
The tour was interesting, and we got to see the ginormous books that the monks kept, each of which weighed about 140 pounds. After the tour, we went to Eduardo´s house, which is right next to the monastery, and is even older than some parts of the monastery itself! We cooked chorizo and rib meat on the grill in his fireplace, has a delicious salad, and some white wine for the hot weather. After lunch, we hiked up to the sister monastery, and snuck into the caves where San Millán himself was buried. The blue sky and perfect weather could not have been better for the trip, and after having a coffee we returned to Logroño city.
For the record - San Millán was a monk, famous for chilling out, and destroying the shit out of the Moors - he apparently killed a thousand of them in one battle. Because of this, he is always represented in statues and paintings on top of a white horse, sword overhead, and the heads of dead Moors at his feet. What a fellonious monk!
Edu smeared mud all over his ear after getting stung by a bee
Veggies from the garden
The gigantic books kept by the monks
The monastery, taken from inside an adjacent hallway
Replica of the two monasteries, Yuso and Suso
Edu´s family´s house
San Millán in the valley, taken from the Suso monastery
Peoples´ ancestors´ bones
San Millán´s tomb - Spanish people were small
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