Montblanc has been a town of walls since the Middle Ages, and the walls are still most of what you see: a circuit of about a kilometre and a half of ramparts, with thirty-odd towers and gates that make it one of the best-preserved medieval enclosures in Catalonia. El Portell de les Lletres lies a short way beyond them, in the folds of the hills south-east of the town, and its name, which suggests a little gap or notch, fits the way a path slips between two rock faces. A rider can combine the shelter with a day of monastic and medieval sightseeing.
The monasteries are the main draw. The Cistercian Route links the great houses of Poblet, Santes Creus and Vallbona de les Monges, and Poblet, on the edge of Vimbodí a few kilometres from here, is the finest, a vast walled complex that served as a royal pantheon of the Crown of Aragon and is on the UNESCO list. The cloister and the fortified gates are worth a slow hour. Santes Creus is a little further, and Vallbona, a convent of nuns, is a quiet visit in the countryside.
Roads in the Conca de Barberà are among the most pleasant in Catalonia for easy riding. They run over rolling country of vineyards and wheat, climb into the wooded Serra de Prades, with its red sandstone and the village of Prades, and wind through the oaks and pines. The bends are easy and the surface good, and with fuel at Montblanc, five kilometres from the shelter, you are never far from supplies. Alcover, eleven kilometres away, is another option.
The wine of the Conca de Barberà is white or red, light and fruity, and most local restaurants serve it with grilled meat and calçots, the long spring onions that Catalans eat in winter and early spring with romesco sauce. Autumn, with the colour in the vines, is a beautiful time. As for the shelter, treat it gently and ask locally about access.