Yesterday saw us walking across beautiful countryside to the spectacular fortified church at Saint Amand de Coly – picture above. We continued past the equally stunning Château de Filolie now subject to an offer by John Wilson. Lunch was on the terrace of a farmhouse above the valley where we sampled foie grasand sweet wine before continuing our walk to the caves at Lascaux. The caretaker refused our offer of bribery to let us into the original caves but Christine Desdemaines-Hugon gave us a talk before a guide took us around the reproduction. No photos allowed – sorry – but everyone was taken with the size of the paintings and the technical skill of the artist who lived 17,000 years ago.
Our return journey was lengthened by a detour to return a sweet natured labrador that had followed us all the way from Saint Amand de Coly. Known to all as Eleanor (of Aquitaine) we will try to publish her photo soon.
Dinner tonight consisted of a mushroom risotto and slow cooked lamb accompanied by a Pomerol of excellent vintage……
From Jim’s journal:
Following breakfast at the hotel, we walk from the hotel to the Abbey Church of St. Amand de Coly. This church was constructed in the 12th Century on the site of an earlier abbey chapel, and combines gothic (plain square columns and corners) and roman (more rounded columns) styles. It was reconstructed in the 19th and 20th Centuries. At St. Amand we meet “Eleanor,” a gentle yellow lab who will be our companion for the next 5 miles despite Peter’s efforts to send her back whence she came (I hope Ben reads and appreciates this sentence). We continue our walk past the Chateau of La Grande Filolie, an attractive 15th Century castle set in a charming woodland setting, and then on to our picnic site at Les Combes village. We sit in chairs in a courtyard next to a small farmhouse owned by a most charming Madam, who provides us with two varieties of Foie Gras made at her farm. Eleanor finds several play mates and seems to get on just fine with them, contrary to Peter’s earlier assertion that Eleanor would be chased away by the local dogs when we reached our picnic destination. In the afternoon, we continue our walk to Lascaux—the site of perhaps the most renown of all the caves with prehistoric paintings. This cave was discovered accidentally in 1940 by four teenage boys when a small hole at the entrance of the cave opened up after a tree was felled in a storm. The boys crawled through a small crevice and slid down a pile of rocks into a cavern now known as the Great Hall of the Bulls. The boys took an oath never to divulge the cave’s existence to anyone. However, four days later they told their school science teacher of their discovery and he immediately explored the cave, recognized its significance and notified pre-historians in Paris of the find. The cave, with its myriad paintings of primarily bulls, horses, and stags painted by Cro Magnon man over 17,000 years ago, was open to the public until 1963 when it was closed to prevent damage to the paintings. Of interest, while the paintings of animals are many and realistic, only a single depiction of a human can be found in the cave—and that is an unrealistic stick figure of a man, deep in the recesses of the cave. Between 1972 and 1983, French authorities completed a complete reproduction of the first two rooms of the cave at a nearby site (Lascaux II), including the Great Hall of the Bulls. It was there that we had the pleasure of a brief lecture on the cave’s paintings by Christine Desdemaine Hugon, followed by a tour of the reproduction cave. A most memorable day. On our drive home, we drop “Eleanor” back at St. Amand in the hope that she belongs there and will find her owner. Then on to our hotel, for a brief rest, the usual cocktails and a wonderful dinner. Total hike this day – 10 miles for Jim, Nita, Rick, John, Bobbie, Rich, Cathy, Bob. Six miles for the others.
How were the caves? Photos needed.