Jardins du Sarlat
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44°53’40.1964″N, 1°13’5.0016″E

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La Roque St. Christophe
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44°59’17.7468″N, 1°4’13.8180″E

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Lascaux Cave Paintings Exhibition
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45°3’30.0096″N, 1°10’10.2432″E

Today we went back on the road again. Our first stop was to visit La Roque St. Christophe, a 30 minute drive from Sarlat. It is a natural limestone cavity about 80 meters above the road surface & one kilometer long. 

Photo above – copied from the internet.

Archaeologists determined that this area was occupied by humans as early as 55,000 years ago & were developed during the middle ages as small cities that offered excellent protection from predator animals & human enemies.

Photo above  – Catherine getting ready to pass through one of the short tunnels linking the ledges together.

Photo above – the view from the beginning of the “community”. Thank goodness there was a substantial railing all along the outside edge. But it was still all I could do to grab this photo quickly & head back towards the inside. I was having quite a time with my vertigo.

Photo above  – the tour started with a model of what the area must have looked like in its prime – based on what remains & what archaeologists have discovered. I guess you could call this one of the original high rise communities.

Photo above  – one of the inlets was set up as a church.

Photo above  – this church even had a pulpit that the priest would preach from!

Photo above  – the display even included some of the machines built to lift items from the ground below.

Photo above – this inlet depicts an area where pottery was made.  There were also sections that present a carpentry shop, a blacksmith shop & areas where food was stored.

There were 2 busloads of public school students touring the area while we were there. The kids were very well behaved but it made me wonder, if it feels this crowded on a rainy, chilly day in late September, I certainly wouldn’t want to be here during the peak season.

All in all it was a very interesting place – even with my vertigo & I am glad we got to see it.

Back on the road again, on our way to Lascaux Cave Paintings Exhibition, which was about another 30-minute drive. 

Photo above  – this area is called Lascaux IV, which was opened to the public in late 2016.  It is a museum/exhibit/replica of all of the painted areas of the original caves.

The original caves are nearby & were discovered in 1940 by a group of young men & their dog. Archaeologists have documented 6,000 figures in 600 paintings on the cave walls. The paintings are estimated to have been done about 17,000 years ago.  There are figures of animals, humans & abstract symbols painted in red, yellow & black colours. The colours were made from mineral pigments.

Photo above  – some of the paintings in the re-created caves.

The original caves were closed to the public in 1963 because the walls were starting to grow mold & fungus generated by moisture & carbon dioxide from the breath of over 1,200 visitors a day.  Authorities were concerned that the paintings would be ruined forever if something wasn’t done but it was also recognized that people wanted to visit the site, see the paintings & learn more.

The site had various exhibits & displays until this facility was created. It is truly amazing. All of the caves were 3D scanned & the location of all paintings was incorporated into the 3D scans.  Next, the caves & their paintings were replicated to be an almost exact copy of the real ones.

When you are on the tour it’s easy to imagine that you are in the real caves. It is dark & the temperature is much lower than outside. Each person is given an audio guide device that automatically senses where you are & then provides a commentary of what you are looking at.

Photo above – after touring the caves you go to an interpretive center where you can view cut-aways of replicated sections of the caves, learn more about the wall & ceiling paintings. 

This is an outstanding facility but it’s easy to become overwhelmed with details. So, if you go, you should be well rested & be prepared to absorb a lot of information in a relatively short time.

Photo above  – one of the main corridors leading from the recreated caves to the interpretive center. There are also several small theatres in the facility that give brief video presentations about the caves & the efforts made to protect & preserve them since their discovery.

We drove back to Sarlat & had a brief rest before going to dinner. We went to Chez Marcel,  a small place recommended by our hosts.

Photo above – our last night in Sarlat with a wonderful glass of wine & very tasty food.

Photo above  – the market square – very empty compared to the day before.

Photo above – the truffle museum at the edge of the square. We missed visiting this one. Oh well, perhaps on another trip. We would certainly be happy to come back to Sarlat again. 

Tomorrow we have a 3 1/2 hour drive back to Bordeaux to return our rental car. We will stay overnight near the train station & then take a train to Paris on Saturday afternoon.

Cheers!

Jardins du Sarlat
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44°53’40.1964″N, 1°13’5.0016″E

Today we thought we would give our car a rest & spend some more time exploring Sarlat.

Our b&b hosts suggested that we check out the Wednesday outdoor market in the center square of the town’s historic district. They cautioned us that it would be pretty busy & crowded & they weren’t wrong.

Photo above – the bronze statue in the foreground is of a young man sitting on the wall without a worry in the world looking at the plaza below.

The outdoor market was very crowded but everyone was in good spirits & it was easy to move around from stall to stall & to stop & shop when you wanted to without feeling pushed. If it’s this busy near the end of September it must be nuts in July & August!

Most of the stalls were fresh food vendors with lots of locals picking up their meat, vegetables, cheese & bread. Some vendors were also selling preserves.

Photo above – a few vendors were selling BIG cans of cassoulet. They were truly family size! I wonder if they sell spam in those size cans? Would be great to have a few cases of each stored in the basement at home as provisions in case of another pandemic or an apocalypse.

The side streets focused more on items that tourists would be most interested in. Catherine enjoyed looking at the scarves & linens & even made a few purchases.

Photo above – while Catherine was shopping in the market stalls I went & explored some of the quiet side streets. We just love this architecture & are so impressed at how France has done such an outstanding job preserving it.

Photo above  – I’ve been having fun learning to use some of the photo editing software that comes with this phone. It’s helped me improve my drawing skills (wink, wink). What do you think?

Photo above – as we explored the side streets it was easy to see that most of these places were private residences & also probably divided up into small apartments & short term rentals because several entrances had 2 or more combination lock boxes for access keys.  It would be interesting to get a closer look at the inside of some of these places.

We had a light lunch at a nearby cafe & then walked back to our b&b for a rest.

Photo above – we pass by this house each time we are walking from our b&b to the town center. It’s obviously much newer than most others in this neighborhood, but the architect did a great job in honouring the heritage of the surrounding buildings.

Early in the evening we had an excellent dinner at an Indian restaurant. Tomorrow we’re back in the car & on the road to see some more sights.

Cheers!

Jardins du Sarlat
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44°53’40.1964″N, 1°13’5.0016″E

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Beynac-et-Cazenac
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44°50’24.3060″N, 1°8’25.9584″E

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Castelnaud-la-Chappelle
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44°48’47.2788″N, 1°9’10.6632″E

Today, to say the least, was a very interesting day.

We started out by driving about 20 minutes from Sarlat to visit Beynac-et-Cazenac. This village is built on a hillside beside the Dordogne River. There is an impressive chateau high up on the hilltop.

Photo above  – Chateau de Beynac, built 9 centuries ago.

The chateau overlooks the river & the valley below. Part of the movie “Chocolat” was filmed there in year 2000 & another movie “The Last Duel”, directed by Ridley Scott, was filmed there in 2021.

Photo above – the Dordogne River below the chateau.

People can charter boats on this river, similar to our adventure a few days ago on the Charente. Looks very peaceful & inviting. I’ll bookmark this info in consideration of our plans for next year. Another interesting fact about this river – it was a border between France & England during the 100 Year’s War. 

Photo above  – the streets in this village were very steep. Thankfully several of them didn’t allow cars. We walked around the village for awhile admiring the architecture & looking in the shop windows. The walk up to the chateau was pretty far so we decided to take a pass & move on to our next destination.

Next, we were going to visit Chateau des Milandes, former home of Josephine Baker, a famous entertainer in France & member of the French Resistance during WWII.  Unfortunately,  we never made it there.

We stopped in Castelnaud-la-Chappelle for a bit & when we started to drive away we had a flat tire. Fortunately, there was a safe place to pull off. When we got parked I checked the trunk for a spare tire but there was none. I called Avis, explained what happened, told them where we were & asked for assistance. They said they would send a repair vehicle to us right away.

Photo above – yep, it’s flat – at least on the bottom!

The repair vehicle driver called me about an hour later & asked where we were. He didn’t speak English so it was a challenge communicating but we finally figured out that Avis had sent him to another town!  We gave him a new set of directions along with our GPS coordinates & he finally found us.

Photo above  – Opie gets a piggyback ride to Sarlat.

The truck driver told us he could not repair the tire at this location so he loaded it on the truck. We rode in the tow truck with the driver down a steep & very curvy road to the tire repair shop in Sarlat.

I think our driver was aspiring to take Daniel Ricardo’s place on the Red Bull F1 team. He was in a hurry to get to Sarlat! It was an exciting ride, to say the least. Cath was less than thrilled & was glad that our wills were up to date.

All said & done, nobody got hurt & no other damage to the car except for a new tire & our bank account being €164.00 lighter.

This was about a 5 hour event so that pretty much ended our sightseeing for the day.

Photo above – back in the main square in Sarlat to find a restaurant for dinner.

After resting for a while at our b&b we walked back to the historic district,  found a nice restaurant, ordered a bottle of wine & reflected on the events of the day.

Tomorrow should be better – fingers crossed!

Cheers!

Balcons de L’Ocean at Biscarrosse
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44°26’55.3128″N, 1°15’14.3460″W

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Saint Emilion Clock Tower
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44°53’36.1212″N, 0°9’22.5360″W

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Jardin du Sarlat
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44°53’40.1964″N, 1°13’5.0016″E

Today we were up early for our drive from Biscarrosse to Sarlat – a distance of about 290 kilometres & approximately 3 1/2 hours according to our GPS.

We planned to stop at a Bouygues Phone office to try to get our phone service sorted out but when we arrived at the GPS location advertised by Bouygues there was only an electronics shop & it was not open.

My phone was working intermittently so I called the help number & finally got through to someone who could speak English. When I explained our problem she simply said to ignore the text messages. I told her our phones stopped working yesterday & she said turn the phones on & off & it will be ok. So, we powered our phones on & off & voila – they were working fine. This is a very confusing system. Hopefully we will not have any more service interruptions before we go home. Fingers crossed!

Anyway,  back to our travel adventures…

Back on the road again, about 1 hour into our trip we drove past Bordeaux on a ring road & then carried on to Saint Emilion. This is a medieval town built on a hillside & completely surrounded by spectacular chateaus & vineyards.

The place was so busy it was a challenge to find a parking spot.  We were just about ready to give up & keep driving to Sarlat when we came across a few empty spaces so we snagged one & went exploring.

Photo above – our first stop was a small cafe to get some coffee & a snack. This photo was taken through the window beside our table. Outside the window it  was straight down about 100 feet to the street below.

Photo above – after lunch we walked through the church that was across the street from the cafe. It was built in the early 12th century & is partially subterranean. The church & all of the town of Saint Emilion was recognized as by UNESCO as a world heritage site in 1999.

Photo above – the exterior design of the church is very basic but it is massive.

Photo above – the clock tower dominates the town square. It chimed several times while we were exploring the streets.

Photo above  – most of the streets in the town are cobblestone, very steep & no vehicles are allowed except ones associated the businesses in the town.

Photo above  –  bakery & cake shop in Saint Emilion. Places like this in France are almost impossible to walk past. Time to get back on the road again.

Photo above – grapes ready for harvest.

As we left Saint Emilion we drove through many vineyards & saw that their harvest was already underway. This reminded Catherine of her time in the Loire Valley in 1980 with her dear friend Jan when they spent 6 weeks picking grapes at a vineyard. No automated harvest then – all picked by hand.

Photo above – arched railway bridge passing over our road on the way to Sarlat.

We continued our drive cross country to Sarlat. It seemed like there was a spectacular view around every corner & at the crest of every hill. This drive took us over an hour longer than if we would have taken the freeway but it was worth every extra minute.

Photo above  – le Jardin du Sarlat – our b&b for the next 4 nights.

This b&b has been operated by an ex-pat British couple for the past 16 years. Wonderful hosts in a very comfortable 230 year old home with lots of interesting stories about their life in France & a wealth of knowledge about the area.

Photo above  – some of the buildings in the historic center of the town.

It was only about a 10 minute walk from our b&b to the center of the town & main restaurant area. We had a very nice meal at a place recommended by our hosts.

Photo above – more of the town center.

Sarlat has the highest density of listed historical buildings in France dating back to the Middle Ages. It is truly stunning.  We can’t wait to spend a lot more time exploring this area over the next few days.

Cheers!

Balcons de L’Ocean at Biscarrosse
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44°26’55.3128″N, 1°15’14.3460″W

We woke up this morning to the sound of thunder & heavy rain. Fortunately, the storm appeared to be coming to an end – a considerable improvement over the weather forecast from a couple of days ago – with a lot of rain forecast for most of Friday,  Saturday & Sunday but most of the predicted bad weather never appeared.

By the time we had finished our breakfast the rain had pretty much stopped & the sun was fighting its way through the clouds.

We had planned for today to be a quiet one, with no driving – just walking around the village & on the beach.

Before we could get started we discovered that both of our phones had stopped working. The SIM cards we bought were supposed to be active until October 4th – 2 days after we would be home. So we were puzzled by what was going on.

Photo above  – our sim – simtimes they work & simtimes they don’t.

About a week ago Catherine & I each got text messages from the Bouygues Telecom company telling us that our service was about to expire & that we had to call a special number to ensure that our phone service would stay active.

I called Bouygues & the operator told me to ignore the message because we were just short term customers & the message really only applied to pay-as-you-go customers. 

This past Friday Catherine & I each got another message from Bouygues so we just ignored it. Then on Sunday – no phone service. And, of course, Bouygues was closed on Sundays so we couldn’t get any assistance.

For some reason my phone service worked sporadically later in the day. I looked up a nearby location for the phone company & we planned to stop there in the morning to get things sorted out.

Enough phone nonsense for now… back to our Sunday adventures.

After breakfast we went for a walk along the beach. As a result of the storm the surf was much louder & wave periods were much closer than the day before. 

Photo above – surfers are having a good time after the storm.

Photo above  – the tide was out quite a ways when we were walking today & the beach close to the dunes was quite wet in several spots where rainwater from the storm was draining down to the tide line. Lots of interesting patterns in the sand from the runoff.

Photo above  – I don’t think I could ever get tired of looking at the waves & walking on this beach.

Photo above – Catherine dusting the sand off her feet after our walk on the beach.

We had a light lunch & Catherine went for another walk while I stayed in our unit to work on the blog & watch some of the F1 race from Singapore. Shortly after she got back from her walk we got a WhatsApp video call from David & Valerie.

They had finished their walk for the day on the Camino de Santiago in Spain & thought it would be fun to catch up with each other. We enjoyed sharing our adventures.

Photo above  – while we were having our dinner we thought we saw a monster bird fly by. Turned out it was someone in a sailing parachute. There were 3 of them sailing on the air currents & updraft created by the wind blowing up the side of the sand dunes.

These guys were very skilled in handling these things. They could even “park” it & hover over one spot for a couple of minutes. It looked like they were having a good time & they rode the air currents around that part of the beach for almost 2 hours. If I wasn’t so afraid of heights I wouldn’t mind giving it a try myself!

Photo above  – a beautiful sunset – the last one we will see from Biscarrosse.

Photo above  – almost gone!  Reminds me of some of the beautiful sunsets we saw in Goderich on Lake Huron & in St. Andrews on Passamaquoddy Bay.

Tomorrow we drive to Sarlat. About a 3 hour drive from Biscarrosse. We will stop at a Bouygues store in the morning to try & get our phones sorted out.

Cheers!