Friday, August 28, 2009
Weapons at Castelnou
The are some great authentic weapons in the museum at Castelnou including crossbows, armour, a multishot gun, a huge crossbow, swords, spears and many others. Here are a few pictures.
Dordogne: post 3
Castelnoud is a castle that was used by the English during the 100 years war to fight against the French who were in Beynac, just a kilometer away. Apparently each side also built chateaus around the area to keep a closer eye on their enemy. Hence there are a number of beautiful, old buildings surrounding the area. The castle is now a museum, which made is so much more enjoyable to tour with Andrew, as there are weapons and many other authentic artifacts from the time on display.
There was a blacksmith outside making items out of steel, a catapult demonstration, and some sword fighting as well. Really interactive.
There are so many beautiful little towns to see in the area with their own unique features. We did a quick visit to St. Cirq Lapopie, which is a small village high on a cliff overlooking the Lot River. The way the homes are packed into the side of the mountain with little alleys running between them is truly amazing. It’s so cool to see all these places.
Dordogne: post 2
Sarlat, where we stayed the night, has a very well-kept medieval city centre where no cars are allowed. Loads of energy in the streets late in to the evening made it an enjoyable late dinner for us. The great thing about the French cities is they all have squares (places) where activities happen, people eat and cafes serve; all this brings so much life to the area. Sarlat’s old city has at least 10 squares of varying sizes that had entertainers doing their thing that night. The old city is in great shape because 800 years ago the French government gave them a load of dough for supporting France in the 100 years war.
Of course, when you’re in the area you have to take in the local food. One of the local delicacies is “fois gras”, which is goose liver. We picked up a couple tins of it at a quaint little farm shop far out in the country as we headed to one of the grottes (caves). In a nut-shell, the geese are force fed for the last few weeks of their lives until they have huge livers that turn out this amazing spread which costs a pretty penny.
We visited two caves while we were in the area. Around here they are called “grottes” and they contain some pretty impressive prehistoric cave drawings. The first grotte was Pech Merle and it was awesome. Stalactites and Stalagmites formed over thousands of years in the many different areas of the caverns where we were toured through in small, controllable groups. Sadly no pictures allowed, but so worthwhile. The cave art was neat and some of the images were quite detailed and very well preserved, over 15 000 years old. Two teenage boys accidently discovered the cave system in the early 1900’s – came across a small hole, crawled through and voila. The cave structure itself was the main fascination for me.
In the other grotte, Rouffignac, we took a train ride down into the cavern where we stopped and were shown the prehistoric artwork. As you can imagine, trying to understand a fast talking tour guide in French with my limited vocab, made for some frustration. We were given little books in English for the tour of Pech Merle. This cave had nothing on the fancy stalactite/stalagmite business at Pech Merle. Pretty much your basic cavern, but did have cool spots where the bears hibernated, and some excellent charcoal drawings of various animals. Bison and mammoths were the main subjects of choice for these prehistoric artisans.
Still more...
Of course, when you’re in the area you have to take in the local food. One of the local delicacies is “fois gras”, which is goose liver. We picked up a couple tins of it at a quaint little farm shop far out in the country as we headed to one of the grottes (caves). In a nut-shell, the geese are force fed for the last few weeks of their lives until they have huge livers that turn out this amazing spread which costs a pretty penny.
We visited two caves while we were in the area. Around here they are called “grottes” and they contain some pretty impressive prehistoric cave drawings. The first grotte was Pech Merle and it was awesome. Stalactites and Stalagmites formed over thousands of years in the many different areas of the caverns where we were toured through in small, controllable groups. Sadly no pictures allowed, but so worthwhile. The cave art was neat and some of the images were quite detailed and very well preserved, over 15 000 years old. Two teenage boys accidently discovered the cave system in the early 1900’s – came across a small hole, crawled through and voila. The cave structure itself was the main fascination for me.
In the other grotte, Rouffignac, we took a train ride down into the cavern where we stopped and were shown the prehistoric artwork. As you can imagine, trying to understand a fast talking tour guide in French with my limited vocab, made for some frustration. We were given little books in English for the tour of Pech Merle. This cave had nothing on the fancy stalactite/stalagmite business at Pech Merle. Pretty much your basic cavern, but did have cool spots where the bears hibernated, and some excellent charcoal drawings of various animals. Bison and mammoths were the main subjects of choice for these prehistoric artisans.
Still more...
The Dordogne Valley
Shortly after my parents, from the Toronto area, departed after a very nice time with us here, the three of us packed up for a few days and headed to the Dordogne valley. Don’t make me pronounce it, as every French person I’ve said it in front of has looked at me funny and then snickered to himself. It’s close to a five-hour drive north of us here in Borde-Neuve.
We started off with a three-hour drive to the city of Albi to check out the museum of the French artist Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec. Many of his most famous works are lithograph posters that advertised for the Moulin Rouge. A lithograph is where the artist carves the original image in reverse into a stone slab and then uses it like a stamp; oils have been rubbed on to the stamp to hold the ink in place. It was a interesting stop – he was a great artist, and his work is more than the lithographs that we know. Andrew enjoyed using the handheld information translator and going around trying to find the next painting with the symbol and number so we could hear more about certain paintings.
Also in Albi was a remarkable Cathedral. Very unique in that it was made of brick rather than the traditional stone, and there is still a barrier in place (called a choir screen) around the alter that was originally used to separate the ceremony itself from the regular parishioners.
In most churches this was removed, but the bishop here opted to keep it and bore a hole out the other end of the church and build a new alter that the congregation could see. Unfortunately, in doing so he took a huge chunk out of the image that was painted on the wall called “The Last Judgement”, that has become quite well known. You know, bad people being burned in hell and all that fun stuff.
After a night in the town of Cahors, we made our way to Sarlat and the Dordogne Valley. Wow. A beautiful, lush area that is so different than here. Totally different agricultural region – corn, wheat, fruit trees, sunflowers, basically farms, stuff that doesn’t grow in our arid region - and also very popular with the tourists. We started off, along with almost everyone else, with a 3 hour canoe trip down the river. The weather was in the 30s, the water was beautiful and the sights of the medieval villages and castles were great. We even bought into the tourist trap of buying a picture that was taken of us while we were heading down river. After all, we really have very few pictures with all three of us in it. Castelnoud and Beynac were highlights from the paddle. Beautiful, tiny villages built into the hillsides. The lines are cleaner, the roofs have a steeper pitch than what we see in the Languedoc-Rousilon region.
More on next post...
We started off with a three-hour drive to the city of Albi to check out the museum of the French artist Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec. Many of his most famous works are lithograph posters that advertised for the Moulin Rouge. A lithograph is where the artist carves the original image in reverse into a stone slab and then uses it like a stamp; oils have been rubbed on to the stamp to hold the ink in place. It was a interesting stop – he was a great artist, and his work is more than the lithographs that we know. Andrew enjoyed using the handheld information translator and going around trying to find the next painting with the symbol and number so we could hear more about certain paintings.
Also in Albi was a remarkable Cathedral. Very unique in that it was made of brick rather than the traditional stone, and there is still a barrier in place (called a choir screen) around the alter that was originally used to separate the ceremony itself from the regular parishioners.
In most churches this was removed, but the bishop here opted to keep it and bore a hole out the other end of the church and build a new alter that the congregation could see. Unfortunately, in doing so he took a huge chunk out of the image that was painted on the wall called “The Last Judgement”, that has become quite well known. You know, bad people being burned in hell and all that fun stuff.
After a night in the town of Cahors, we made our way to Sarlat and the Dordogne Valley. Wow. A beautiful, lush area that is so different than here. Totally different agricultural region – corn, wheat, fruit trees, sunflowers, basically farms, stuff that doesn’t grow in our arid region - and also very popular with the tourists. We started off, along with almost everyone else, with a 3 hour canoe trip down the river. The weather was in the 30s, the water was beautiful and the sights of the medieval villages and castles were great. We even bought into the tourist trap of buying a picture that was taken of us while we were heading down river. After all, we really have very few pictures with all three of us in it. Castelnoud and Beynac were highlights from the paddle. Beautiful, tiny villages built into the hillsides. The lines are cleaner, the roofs have a steeper pitch than what we see in the Languedoc-Rousilon region.
More on next post...
Tuesday, August 25, 2009
Barcelona
Have I been to Barcelona yet, you ask? Why yes I have. With the close proximity of Perpignan to the Spain border, it made sense for us to fly into Barcelona. We took the train to Perpignan upon our arrival and I have since been back four more times. It’s a three-hour drive from our place in Borde Neuve. The first time back was to pick up Kevin and Michelle and bring them home. The second was to drop them off on a Saturday and pick up my parents on the Sunday, who were coming to visit for a couple weeks. The third time was to come back again on the Monday because their flight had been cancelled the previous day. The fourth time was to drop them off for their return flight. It is safe to say that I am getting comfortable with the drive to Barcelona…although I still only know two words: hello and thank you. Sadly, all that ‘Dora the Explorer’ did not rub off on me.
The sights we’ve seen in Barcelona have been fabulous. We visited the Sangrada Familia with Kevin and Michelle, which is the massive cathedral in the city designed by Gaudi. It has been under construction for over 100 years, and is slated for completion around 2030. They pull in a pretty penny from the visitors touring through it each day. The designs of the pillars, windows and towers are a sight not to be missed. Gaudi took most of his architectural design from nature and they are amazingly recreated in the structure.
We also went to the Parc Guell, which was an upper class, private community Gaudi designed in the early 1900’s that went sour. It’s now a park, showing off all of his creative designs for houses and community space. Tons of tile collages in the chairs and ceilings, as well as crazy looking viaducts (raised walkways) and uniquely shaped houses. One very much takes after a typical house in a Dr. Seuss book, and another totally resembles a gingerbread house.
He has a few other cool buildings down towards La Rambla, which help create a very unique feel to the city with his interesting architecture. La Rambla is a tourist mecca with a myriad of shops and restaurant and people walking the two main streets and the alleys in between. The main thing we were told going to this area was to keep a very close eye on your wallet. Our neighbour has had many friends leave them saying ‘oh it won’t happen to me’, and it ends up happening to them. Fortunately both our visits to this area have been without incident. Spain, in general, is cheaper than France, and it is especially noticeable in the food.
While in Spain we also visited the city of Girona, which is about two hours from home. Very colourful buildings tightly line the river that runs through the city, with pedestrian walkways joining the two sides. There are great narrow streets for browsing the shops and a historic Jewish quarter where the Jewish population was once forced to reside within a sealed-off section of the city (ca. 1300). One of the pedestrian bridges (a pretty red one) was constructed by the Eiffel construction company is the 1860’s.
A large cathedral lies in this city, as well as a roman bath. It’s amazing how the buildings are tied together with rock walls and every nook and cranny is filled with a building of some odd shape.
We took in a tapas place for dinner and were blown away by the spread that was offered. In a buffet style, you went up and helped yourself to as many of the 50 or so tapas available. Each had a large toothpick through it. At the end of the meal your server added up you toothpicks and charged you a flat rate for each one. Now, with me not being a very adventurous eater, you’ll have to take Jacqui, Kevin and Michelle’s word for it that there were some very unique and tasty tapas (both sweet and savory) to be had.
If you are interested in further reading about our trip here, I suggest you check out Kevin and Michelle’s blog, as the have some great posts of their time here. The site address is:
http://chowharrison.blogsome.com
Sunday, August 23, 2009
It's about doing nothing sometimes...
What did we do while Kevin and Michelle hiked for four days? Nothing. They worked while we relaxed beachside or riverside. Okay, we did break a sweat a couple of times in their honour when we played some tennis. That was about it.
Before you think I have let you off easy with a short blog entry… this is my time to air a beef of mine. I know that when people are in the great outdoors and washrooms are not available, people will utilize the bushes. Fair enough. What bothers me, here, is that the bushes are practically trailside, and no one seems to take the used toilet paper with him or to bother to flick the solid waste . It is quite lovely to walk along the path to the river, holding your nose and dodging mottled tissue and human scat.
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