Canal du Midi

We woke up to the heartiest breakfast of our trip at Domaine Caraman!  Marion prepared an egg omelet with herbs, ham, cheese, yogurt, breads and croissants, cafe au lait, and fresh fruit.  She grows her own kiwi and makes jam.  So good!

After breakfast, we left the farm for Revel.  The food market there is considered one of the best in all of France.  It was terrific!  We bought grapes, croissants, a cooked potato dish, crispy cookies, and more.  We enjoyed walking around and looking at the many varieties of produce available.  We also enjoyed the almond "melt in your mouth" cookies that we bought.

We went to the tourism office at the market and received advice about a couple of places to visit nearby.  We took the advice and drove to Soreze, a village only 5 km from Revel.  Soreze is an ancient village with a large abbey, still active.  As it was sprinkling rain, the flowers were particularly beautiful.

On our return south, we made a stop at La Pomarede, a chateau that has been converted to a town inside, with the town hall, post office, a school, and a hotel with restaurant.

Then driving a little further south and to a quiet spot on the Canal du Midi, we parked the car and went for a walk.  The engineering feat of the Canal du Midi is impressive, with 241 km of man made canal, 12,000 workers were employed to build it, 45,000 trees were planted to reinforce the banks, and 350 engineered structures were built (bridges, aqueducts and locks), all in 14 years and it was inaugurated in 1681.  Canal du Midi is protected as a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

We stopped at the Monastery de Priohle, a Dominican monastery still in use.  We saw nuns out for a walk.  Then we drove up the hill to Fanjeaux, an ancient city with a cathedral built in 1206 and panoramic views of the whole area.  While at Fanjeaux, a light rain started to fall, so we were happy to get back to Domaine Caraman within a few minutes.  Papa went on a tour of the farm buildings with the owner/farmer, William.  They've done a tremendous amount of work on the property and it is quite evident.  We are happy to be warm and dry in a nice spot.

A Few Days on a Farm

We had a terrific send off breakfast at Maison Laurent and then we started our day with cooler temps, lots of wind, and overcast skies.  We drove north over the Canal du Midi in Bram to Montolieu, known as a city of books.  Montolieu is boxed in by rivers on two sides with a bridge built in the 14th century and still in use.  We stopped at a tourism office and chatted with a helpful woman, who directed us on to Saissac.

The castle ruins in Saissac were impressive with beautiful views south toward the Pyrenees.  We walked around the castle ruins and into the local cathedral, but the wind was piercing through us, so we didn't stay long.

We drove from Saissac along a ridge road toward Castelnaudery, with farms on both sides of the road, lots of sheep grazing and spectacular views of the Pyrenees.  We came to the small village of Saint Papoul and walked around the ancient abbey, still in use.  We had lunch in Castelnaudery and drove a bit along the Canal du Midi.

In making our circle drive for the day, we drove through the village of Montgeard, not mentioned in any book we've seen, with a gem of a brick cathedral with one of the most intricately painted interiors we've seen.

Then on to Mazeres, another red brick town with a large cathedral and an abandoned abbey.  Then through Fanjeaux and Montreal, the most picture perfect hilltop towns we've seen on the trip, to our bed and breakfast for the next three nights, Domaine Caraman.

Domaine Caraman is a B and B on a farm, with the current owners here for 32 years.  They are Dutch, William and Marion.  The house was built over 200 years ago, in the typical French farm style, with the house and barn attached.  About 6 years ago, they converted the barn portion to living space for guests, to supplement their farming income.  As we are the only guests, we have a bedroom and bath upstairs with a large living area with fireplace, full kitchen, and dining area to ourselves.  The owners have their own home attached.  Marion prepared coffee for us when we arrived, and left us with nuts, fruit, and a refrigerator full of snacks.  The views from Domaine Caraman are beautiful.  We're happy to be in the countryside on a farm for a few days.

The Grand Carcassonne

Another wonderful start to our day with a fabulous breakfast at Maison Laurent.  Soon after breakfast, we took off for Mirepoix, about 35 km from where we are staying.  Mirepoix has a large market square surrounded by half timbered two story buildings with deep arcades, a carousel, and a very large cathedral.  The cathedral had a most unusual painted ceiling of dark blue with stars.  A lovely village!  There was a lot of activity with people out and about.  We enjoyed our short visit.

We drove from Mirepoix toward Carcassonne through some of the most beautiful countryside we've seen in France.  The area from Fanjeaux to Montreal was rolling farm land dotted with vineyards, the Pyrenees mountaintops to the south and the wide valley of the Canal du Midi to the north.  Several hilltop villages were visible along the way.  Just exquisite!

We drove through the center of the city of Carcassonne to the medieval Cite, considered the most perfectly restored medieval town in the world and protected by UNESCO.  It is out of a fairy tale with turrets and stone walls surrounding a good size village.  The site has been important since the 2nd century BC and was in it's prime in the 12th century.  The Cite was restored in the 1860's, led by Violet le Duc.  It is a stunning site!

With all this travel and only a couple of small suitcases, we had to do our housekeeping late in the afternoon, so drove to Limoux to do laundry.  We had a snack in the market square while our clothes were washing and walked along the Aude River while they were drying.  With clean clothes, we're ready for the next few days adventures!

Peyrepertuse

We woke to one of the most lavish breakfasts of our trip, with certainly the best croissants, at Maison Laurent.  By 10 we were off and backtracking a bit, as we drove south toward the Pyrenees.  We passed Chateau Cousstasa again (also the day before) and drove on to another Cathar Castle, Peyrepertuse.  The books describe Peyrepertuse as "a ruined fortress high in the French Pyrenees, standing at 800m high.  The name Peyrepertuse means Pierced Rock.  The lower castle was built on a strategic location by the kings of Aragon in the 11th century and the higher castle by Louis IX later on.  The two castles are linked by a staircase carved into rock.  The castle lost importance as a strategic castle when the border between France and Spain was moved in 1659, causing the castle to be abandoned."  Our opinion of Peyrepetuse after climbing and exploring for a couple of hours was "WOW!"  It is amazing that people were building such tall structures with cut stones at such a high altitude in 1000!

From Peyrepertuse, the Cathar Castle of Queribus is visible.  After spending so much time at Peyrepertuse, we only took photos of Queribus.

We passed another castle ruin in the village of Padern and then stopped in the village of Villerouge Termenes and walked around the Cathar Castle there, now owned and maintained by the village.  It is different than most Cathar Castles as it is down low near a stream and in quite good shape.

The roads we were driving on were quite narrow and winding, so we made a decision to go to Lagrasse, because the road was good.  Lagrasse is a pretty village on a river with a large ancient abbey still in use.  We saw the monks inside going about their daily chores.

Back on our way, we got on a one lane paved path and didn't pass another vehicle for over 40 km.  The drive was beautiful, with the leaves turning and we drove over hundreds of small stone bridges built over streams with miles of stone wall ruins throughout the countryside.  The first village of any size we came to was St Hillaire with a beautiful ancient abbey. 

We arrived back at Maison Laurent by 5:30 and relaxed a bit before having a wonderful dinner prepared by Anthony and Rachel, endive salad with apples, walnuts, and roquefort cheese, mushroom risotto, and apple tart with apple sorbet for dessert.  We not only enjoyed dinner but our conversation with them, as well.  Another wonderful day!

Montsegur and more Cathar Castles

Papa and I were up early this morning, which means before 8.  We left Chateau de Beauregard in St. Girons by 8:45 and were off toward Foix in a light rain.  We were driving into Foix within thirty minutes.  The three towers of the Cathar castle are visible for miles as they are atop a natural hill set within a tight river valley in the Pyrenees foothills.  The setting is quite beautiful and the city is quite nice.  We had coffee and walked around a bit before driving on.

We drove through miles of tree lined roads toward Roquefixade, a Cathar castle ruin atop a rock cliff.  A little village sits below.  We walked around the village and heard people in the small church singing while cows in nearby fields were wearing cowbells.  On a mountaintop not far away was another mountaintop castle ruin, Montsegur.  The views and sounds were like a fairy tale!

Montsegur was less than 25km away.  We parked the car, bundled up, and started the trek up the side of the mountain.  The path was steep and the rise in each step was high and uneven.  Montsegur was supposedly the final Cathar holdout and quite famous in Europe.  It is not easy to get to by road or on foot but there were lots of other visitors on a Tuesday in November!  The hike up and back down took over an hour.  The views in all directions were spectacular.  The site was so rugged that it was hard to imagine  that hundreds of people were captured by an attacking militia in the 1240's.  Those people were tough!

We continued down the road, stopping for crepes for lunch, then at another Cathar castle, Puivert.  It is privately owned and a large ruin.  We walked around a bit and then drove to another Cathar castle, Coustaussa.  Neither of these were as impressive as Montsegur, but certainly interesting to see in their spectacular settings in the Pyrenees Mountains.

We stopped at Alet le Bains, a small village with ancient ruins with thermal springs.  The ruins of an abbey are in the center of town, large and imposing.  The carvings in the stonework were beautiful.  The whole of the village was pretty and enjoyable.

We came on through Limoux and to our bed and breakfast for the next three nights, Maison Laurent.  It is in the little hamlet of Prieusse, which is not particularly interesting, but is surrounded by vineyards.  The house is four stories and centuries old.  A British couple, Rachel and Anthony, bought the house two years ago, completely renovated it, adding a large kitchen and six bathrooms, along with all new windows, and garden.  They invited us to have soup with them for dinner and we enjoyed hearing their story of buying and renovating the place.  They have become successful very quickly as Anthony was in the travel business in the UK and is good at marketing the property.

Happy Halloween

Happy Halloween from Lulu and Papa!

Photo taken at market in Prayssac, France.