In a blue paradise

Some say that on cer­tain days the ghosts of artist Marc Cha­gall and Hol­ly­wood acress Ava Gard­ner ap­pear in Tossa's Vila Vella. The for­mer, who had fled the Nazis in the 1930s, found what he called his 'Blue Par­adise' in Tossa, while the lat­ter, like a mod­ern Pan­dora, who in Greek mythol­ogy was the first mor­tal woman, turned this iso­lated sea­side set­tle­ment into a gem in which sea and moun­tain em­braced in a vir­gin land­scape, at­tract­ing vis­i­tors keen on re­veal­ing its se­crets.

Tossa has re­tained its at­trac­tions, es­pe­cially its beaches, which are mul­ti­ple and var­ied, from Mar Menuda to the Bona, Pola and Fu­tadera coves. At the same time, the vis­i­tor can choose from a va­ri­ety of coastal paths or make an ex­cur­sion to the nearby Cadi­retes mas­sif, a mys­ti­cal place that blends myth with his­tory and which rises to over 500 me­tres at its high­est point. It is near here, for ex­am­ple, where the Mare de Déu de Gràcia her­mitage is to be found. It is said that this her­mitage was once known as the Sant Lions church, from a first men­tion dat­ing back to 966. The build­ing was partly de­stroyed in the Penin­su­lar War.

This is also the lo­ca­tion of the build­ing ded­i­cated to Sant Grau d'Au­ril­lac, whose relics were re­moved by Queen Maria de Mont­peller around 1200. After years of ne­glect, Sant Grau was bought by the local au­thor­ity in 2009 from Iber­caja for a mil­lion euros. In 2013, it re­opened, with a bar on its ter­race.

For those look­ing for views of the Mediter­ranean, the coastal path from the Ll­e­vador cove to the Vila Vella, pro­vides a vir­gin space be­tween blue sea and nat­ural white cliffs.

And, when the day is over, whether spent en­joy­ing the beach or ex­plor­ing the land­scape, the town's new and old quar­ters re­main to be dis­cov­ered. The for­mer is ideal for gas­tron­omy, shop­ping and fun, while the lat­ter, the Vila Vella, is a for­ti­fied area forged by tales of war and pi­rates.

For cul­ture lovers there is the local mu­seum, lo­cated in the cen­tre of the walled old town in the Falguera house, which is also known as the house of the Batlle de Sac or Cal Gov­er­nador. Here is to be found Cha­gall's The Ce­les­tial Vi­o­lin­ist, as well as paint­ings from Cata­lan artists, such as Emili Ar­men­gol, Lola Bech, Rafael Benet, Joan Brull, Ri­card Canals, Pere Créixams, Emili Grau-Sala, Jaume Mer­cadé, Josep Palau and Joaquim Sun­yer, and those of for­eign painters, such as Georges André Klein, André Mas­son, Jean Met­zinger, Olga Sacharoff, Julius W. Schülein and Oscar Zügel.

Mean­while, there is also the An­cient Hos­pi­tal of Sant Miquel. This for­mer hos­pi­tal was founded in 1773 as a hos­pi­tal for the poor. Its founder, Tomás Vidal i Rey, had made his for­tune in the Amer­i­cas. It is a two-story build­ing with a cen­tral court­yard, and now houses the town's cul­tural cen­tre.

Fi­nally, we can­not leave Tossa with­out men­tion­ing its food of­fer­ing, es­pe­cially the tra­di­tional fish and veg­etable stew known as “cim i tomba”, a blend of sea and moun­tain that re­flect the spirit of the sea­side re­sort.