Besalú's Romanesque bridge is the last flat thing you see: the road turns off for Beuda and lifts gently through farmland before the climbing starts in earnest at the village. From there it is narrow, quiet tarmac that never settles into a rhythm, dropping into a dip and rearing to over 10% around a single corner, with steep hairpins wound through forest where the only view is trees. The last 6.6 km are the real work, 7 to 10% with steeper pitches inside it, and roughly 3 km from the top the trees give out and the whole region opens: the Pyrenees with Canigó behind the summit, the lake at Banyoles below, the Costa Brava on a clear day. At the top there is the sanctuary itself, a bar-restaurant with a terrace (shut Tuesdays and Wednesdays) and a statue of the poet Jacint Verdaguer. Keep something back for the way down, because the road is narrow, twisting and blind in places, with cars coming up it.