A walk through the old town of Ponts

Duration: 60′ – Plaça Planell · Carrer Major · Plaça del Blat · Parish church of Santa Maria de Ponts · Pou de Gel (ice well)

We’ll begin the walk at the Plaça Planell, in the centre of the town, where we’ll see the “Casa de la Vila” (Town Hall) and the façades of the houses around it, with the sheds on the western side.

Next, we’ll head north towards the Carrer Major, the town’s most historic street. This street has always had an artisan character, and until not long ago it was home to craftspeople and traders who used the ground floors of the houses as workshops or shops. It was the backbone of the first walled enclosure of the old town, or oppidum, of Ponts, taking shape over the course of the 11th and 12th centuries. In terms of form, the houses were built in the most usual way of the time: two load-bearing walls with a single span, resulting in the narrow, elongated plot we call gothic, with dwellings featuring a workshop or shop on the floor facing the central street, and yards and rooms at the back for storing carts or livestock. From the late Middle Ages, this street had porticoes or sheds attached to the houses, to ease the passage of pedestrians and the holding of fairs and markets in all weathers.

We’ll also pause to take in the Plaça del Blat, with a public fountain in the centre, which was the space where the old grain market took place.

At the end of the street we’ll reach the parish church of Santa Maria de Ponts, a temple of Gothic origin; inside the church, a must-see is the altarpiece of the Mare de Déu del Roser (Our Lady of the Rosary, 17th c.), set in the Roser chapel — a large altarpiece, carved in polychrome wood and dedicated to Our Lady of the Rosary and the Mysteries of the Rosary. A few metres further on we’ll find the Pou de Gel (ice well), recently restored.