discovering.. SELVA de MAR

The Costa Brava is not only a coast with strongly populated beaches or dreamy bays. Also the villages in the hinterland, mostly nearby the sea, reward for a visit. A special jewel is, only about 2 km from Port de la Selva, the village Selva del Mar. Off of the peak season, particularly under the week, it may happen, that one is in fact still the only tourist here. An asphalted street leads to the village, hidden in the valley of the “Riera de la Selva”. Right through the village the way leads to the small river, dry in the summer, whose banks hem old houses of Romance origin. At the end of the village we meet the “font dels Lledoners”: a famous source which described Jaume Quintana, Alcalde – mayor – of Selva de Mar, historian and poet, as follows: > at the font dels Lledoners the murmur of the water mixes with the song of the birds, that refresh at the early morning here with the source, before they lift into the air…

… and every day “refresh” in fact summer visitors themselves with this source: A rare pleasure for city people who quench their thirst here in the shadow of the plane trees; with fresh, clean spring water, so as our ancestors did it a long time ago. A lot of them carry receptacles with themselves in order to allow this pleasure of fresh water also at home and that all for very nothing.

The special purity of the sources water made it well known. It flows down directly from the mountains into the valley and does not contain any chemical substances.

What concerns the history of the village, so one almost knows it only through verbal traditions of the old inhabitants. A majority of the village archive fell during the civil war to the sacrifice of the flames. The oldest still preserved document comes from the year 974: The proof of a donation of the earl of Empuries to the cloister Sant Pere de Rodes consisting of a chapel on the present village ground, and it is mentioned in the document that the chapel was built in the VII. Century. Forest – Selva – covered the hills and gave the village his name. Under the influence of the monks of Sant Pere the agriculture developed. Well protected against the attacks of the pirates, the first inhabitants grew vine stocks and the olive trees imported by the Romans. Also the fishing was important source of revenue in this time, the fishermen lived, however, here in the inner land and they maintained only , as in Llançà, at the beach ( of the contemporary Port de la Selva) some huts in which they stowed their working material. The defence tower in Selva de Mar shows still this era of the piracy.

So Port de la Selva is in fact the child of Selva de Mar.

In the XIX. Century the agriculture was the most important branch of the village and remained it until In the fifties of the twentieth century. The miracle of the current allowed the running of engines, from the 15 July till to the middle of November the oil mills were working. The oil production of the village was in fact important. In 1956 the olive trees fell however to a severe frost period to the sacrifice and that was then the end of the professional olive oil production. The small agriculture museum which shows rural device can be visited.

Unlike the boom of the tourism Selva de Mar conserved more or less its identity. During the main season and at the weekends live here, however, nevertheless a grand number of holiday visitors. But a lot of them are of village origin and renovated the houses of the village respectfully.

The professions of the nowadays inhabitants follow, however, the signs of the time and concentrate on tourism, commerce and construction. The least, however, moves here only in the small frame. The architectural substance was only few changed, the village retained his country-typical character.

[cetsEmbedGmap src=http://maps.google.es/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=es&geocode=&q=selva+de+mar+&sll=40.396764,-3.713379&sspn=6.960084,11.865234&ie=UTF8&hq=&hnear=La+Selva+de+Mar,+Gerona,+Catalu%C3%B1a&ll=42.324032,3.187408&spn=0.211191,0.370789&t=p&z=11 width=350 height=425 marginwidth=0 marginheight=0 frameborder=0 scrolling=no]