Chartres Cathedral

On our journey from the southwest up to Paris, there were a couple things we wanted to do. Visiting Chartres, a nice small city with probably the best preserved gothic cathedral in France (perhaps all of Europe) was high on our list. Chartres is about 50 miles southwest of Paris, and this distance helped it avoid the damage and destruction incurred by Notre Dame de Paris during the French Revolution (1789). Construction of both Chartres and Notre Dame was begun in the second half of the 12th century, both on sites that had already housed churches and chapels for hundreds of years. Chartres is very unusual in that it still has more than 80+% of the original statuary and stained glass windows from 800 years ago. Think about it, 800 year old stained glass windows! Amazing. There are over 200 stained glass windows and each one was removed, piece by piece, and stored during both world wars. Another feature of Chartres that differs from Notre Dame, is that it has spires on its west façade, and they don’t match! (one is from the 12th century, the more ‘flamboyant’ one from the 16th century). We arrived late afternoon and went to the cathedral after checking into our hotel. We were very fortunate to arrive just as two services were about to begin, Vespers and then the evening mass. We were able to admire the rose windows and architecture while enjoying the fine organ music and singing amid the smell of incense and the priest & people praying in French. One certainly doesn’t need to be religious or ‘church going’ to appreciate the majesty, history and incredible beauty & acoustics of Chartres.

more Giverny pix

Giverny

Visiting Monet’s House & Gardens was a real thrill. I’m so glad after all these years of adoring Impressionist paintings and of teaching a unit on Impressionism to have finally visited Giverny. We arrived early, which was a good thing, because as we left, this was the most crowded site we’d been to yet. The gardens were fabulous, spring was in full bloom, the flowers magnificent. The wisteria, so emblematic to me of Monet, was not yet in bloom here, although we’d seen lots of it in the Dordogne and southern France. The visitor center is in his studio and full of black & white pictures of Monet: at work and at ease. The house was lovely, with many of the japanese prints that so inspired him. We even got to stand on the Japanese bridge and had the area pretty much to ourselves. It was very peaceful and I could fully appreciate how it inspired Monet, and the many other impressionists who came here to paint.

Oradour-sur-Glane

Oradour-sur-Glane, a village just west of Limoges, was beseiged, burnt out, 642 of its inhabitants slaughtered, a mere four days after the Normandy Beaches, DDay invasions by the allies in June 1944. Also known as ‘le village des martyrs’, it was decided to leave the village in ruins, as a reminder of those who died and of the atrocities of war and intolerance. It was very powerful walking around the ruins, visiting the burnt out church where the women and children were slaughtered & burned and the other buildings where the men were herded and killed. History is a funny thing, it’s amazing to think that this happened a mere 60+ years ago. It’s also amazing that Germany rose so quickly after World War I, to devastate Europe again in WWII.
There was also a fabulous exhibit memorializing 9/11, many details of which I had already forgotten. Many famous quotes were scattered around the exhibit, including the profound quote by George Santayana which I may not get entirely right here: “Those who cannot learn from history are doomed to repeat it”.

Skinny streets and animal life

It’s really odd, but our friend Rich from Duluth pointed out some weeks ago that he hadn’t seen a single squirrel in our travels around southern France. I have still to report that after nearly 6 weeks, we have yet to spot one! We have seen all sorts of bird life, hawks, eagles, swifts, swallows, seagulls, heron, egret, doves, pigeons, swans and lots of ducks! Along the river we also saw otter (muskrat?) and turtles. Of course in the fields we have seen goats, sheep, cows and lots of geese (we’ve been in the land of foie gras!) There have been plenty of cute green lizards around, but remarkably no squirrels or chipmunks, or mice, rats or rabbits for that matter!

The roads we’ve been travelling for the most part have been very good, but never very wide. Luckily Peter has practice with this from the English lanes he’s driven over the years. I have a few photos of roads, mostly in medieval towns, where two cars really shouldn’t have to meet and pass each other. Makes for exciting driving!

And putting the two together, driving & animals, there has been virtually NO roadkill anywhere we’ve been. We’ve been driving in ver unpopulated areas, way out in the boonies. There have been signs occasionally for deer or other animals crossing, but we have yet to see much of anything!

Kayaking down the Dordogne

A little bit of heaven. Five hours mostly floating down the Dordogne in 70 degree, sunny weather. We put in at Carsac and took out at St Vincent de Cosse, about 25 km. It was gorgeous. The first section is more ‘wild’, little sign of human habitation, nice little islands to explore around, amazing cliff faces (some with visible entrances up really high). The river level is very high, so the current is incredibly swift, with lots of flooded areas to go through and explore. It also means we could have gone the 25 km with paddling at all had we wished. But we didn’t. The second half of the river went through a very ‘castle dense’ area, with stunning views up at the chateaux Castelnaud, Beynac, Faynac and others. As mentioned earlier, these river valleys are riddled with caves and troglodyte dwellings. You could see many old cliff entrances from the river, which must have been VERY useful as shelter during various periods of French history, the middle ages for sure, not to mention during the French Resistance in World War II (this area was very active in that). It was a great day and the sun was most appreciated.

CAVES!

The Dordogne and Vézère valleys are absolutely riddled with caves, all sorts of caves. We visited one (la Gouffre de Padirac) which was hundreds of meters below the surface (over 1600 stairs down!) with an underground river and fantastic stalactite/stalagmite formations (very cool boat ride along underground river and lake). Gorgeous. We visited one (Bara Baheu) that had ‘etchings’ into the rock of animals, dating from prehistoric times. Hannah & I went to Lascaux yesterday, the famous site of fabulous cave paintings only discovered in the 1940s, closed to the public in the 1960s with a picture perfect replica opened to the public in the 1980s (Lascaux II). It was incredibly beautiful and not to be missed even though it’s a recreation. We also visited a ‘chateau’ built into the side of a cliff and its caves, with many artifacts from prehistory. Every where you look when driving along these valleys, you see what appear to be cave entrances high on cliffs, there are many, many ‘troglodyte’ cave sites, and innumerable underground cave sites both to visit and others merely visible as you pass them. Quite amazing. It was fun at Lascaux imagining the reaction of the four teenage boys who discovered the paintings in the 40s after their dog fell through a hole into the caves. We imagined taking a torch and finding those massive, beautiful, colorful paintings of bulls and horses. Must have been amazing (and a little freaky!). ps: pix taken from book about padirac as impossible/forbidden to photograph cave.

Le Bugue

We have been staying in a town called Le Bugue, in a lovely house overlooking the Vézère River (The one with the blue shutters in the 2nd pic). Le Bugue is a nice little market town with a really good weekly market. It has all the amenities one would need within walking distance. It’s been really nice being on the river, which is quite high this spring. We’ve been VERY fortunate with the weather, most days in the last week or so in the 60s or 70s and mostly sunny. There is a large patio overlooking the river, with loads of ducks and lots of other bird life to watch. The river is lovely in the night light, very swift current which reflects the light at night. I haven’t seen a single boat or canoe on this river, but have on the Dordogne. (Hoping the weather will hold and we’ll kayak Friday past some chateaux on the Dordogne).

The Vezere & Dordogne

The Vezere River (where our house is and the valley with Lascaux and many other caves & castles) flows into the Dordogne River at the village of Lemeuil (very pretty!). The Dordogne then flows down into the Garonne (where the Dordogne is nearly 3km wide!) and they form the huge Gironde delta at Bordeaux. We took a Gabarre (flat bottom boat used in the previous few centuries for bringing salt, etc., upriver from Bordeaux) from Roque Gageac down as far as the bridge to Castnaud. It is a beautiful stretch of river with medieval to renaissance castles lining the river. I continue to be amazed visiting this area, by the sheer volume of historic properties, for lack of a better term. Every little town seems to have an amazing chateau or church, ruins of a castle, fabulous caves, much of which is not mentioned on any maps or guidebooks, but which are just the fabric of the area. I think I need to spend more time here exploring and studying the history of this region ;  )  .

Provence to the Dordogne

Leaving Provence was sad, but heading to the Dordogne was a good way to assuage our sadness! After saying goodbye to our good friends Cindy & Rich, we spent 2 nights en route, in a couple of beautiful towns. We spent one night in Albi, the birthplace of the painter Toulouse Lautrec (and a lovely city on the Tarn River. The town is oddly, nearly completely constructed in red brick, including the MASSIVE catherdral Ste-Cecile.) It has gorgeous half 

timbered houses on thin little roads, and seemed like something out of Dickens. Hannah & I really enjoyed the Toulouse Lautrec museum housed in the Palais de la Berbie and its gardens. 

                                        We spent the next night in Bergerac, in 

the Dordogne, where we met up with Peter’s sisters & brother-in-law from England. Bergerac was another beautiful city (where I had a delicious 'steak au poivre' et frites, dining outdoors), this time on the Dordogne River and familiar to many for the book/movie ‘Cyrano de Bergerac’ (also remade into a more modern version with Steve Martin as the huge-nosed lead, called ‘Roxanne’) 

Cyrano de Bergerac |ˈsirənō də ˈbər zh əˌrak; ˈber zh ˌrak|

Cyrano de Bergerac, Savinien (1619–55), French soldier, duelist, and writer. He is chiefly remembered for the large number of duels that he fought (many because of his proverbially large nose) as immortalized in Cyrano de Bergerac (1897), a play by Edmond Rostand.