From Carcassonne (and mountains) to the Coast

Friday 18/10/2013

That damn alarm clock! It is apparently no use at all, when situated within reach, and of course everything in our ‘bedroom’ is within reach. After another late start we eventually leave St Pierre sur mer. Perhaps I was just reluctant to leave, at ease with our surroundings and seduced by the lazy slow beat of the beach town.

We drive the van into town to do our laundry, since it is overcast and cooler, perhaps 21’. We find parking a thousand miles from the launderette and I complain about carrying the folded linen contraption another yard. Eventually with machines on their allotted wash, I move the van close to the launderette, using someone’s driveway. The dryers are massive and after 30 minutes you could cook an egg on the front, so our towels must be dry, and jeans too.

It is after one by the time we move the van close to Fluery, and we have an appointment with the agent at 2pm to see a village house he thinks we will like. We leave the van in the forest nature reserve outside Fluery and take the bike in. The village house is a disappointment; it is enormous and divided into two flats, each with two bedrooms. Downstairs the kitchen has been gutted and not yet refitted, and everything is threatened by the enormous tree on the terrace, which would loom over the roof if given its freedom. The agent tells us it is nice and shaded in the hot summer. Not for us. We tell the M. Eric we liked the older house on the edge of the village and will continue looking around near the coast in Languedoc. He smiles and wishes us bonne journée.

We drive to Carcassonne. It is originally a medieval town, and is said to be very pretty, although it is not featured in Brigitte’s guide to undiscovered France, which we read every evening. Perhaps that is because everyone has discovered it already.

We are parked in a very ordinary edge of town car park, which accommodates camping cars. Not very exciting, but full of vans, and it is the best location from which to explore.

Saturday 19/10/2013

I am woken by the sound of an English lady speaking French outside our window. We leave a bedroom window open and a roof vent and it allows air to circulate. This way the fridge can be left on gas, and in any event, it is vented outside the van. The lady is discussing how to fit French gas cylinders to her English van, and I can easily follow her French, but not so easily the Frenchman’s replies.

Anyway it seems courteous to get up and try and help, since I am now an expert on getting the correct fittings. When I get up the woman is about to drive off, but stops and we discuss her predicament. She has been running off English gas and is about to run out, and wondered if she could run off camping gaz. She has purchased the correct hosing, which has 13mm threads, one which screws to the right, and the other end to the left. Unfortunately this doesn’t work with camping gaz! I show her our set up, but the problem she has is that her LPG compartment is smaller than ours and she may need to get a ‘cube’, or a 6kg cylinder. I explain she may need an adaptor that fits onto the top of the cylinder. The man on the other side of us comes to agree in French, and shows us his LPG set up. He has a French cylinder and then a German one, which is LPG refillable. He takes off the adaptor to show her what it looks like, and tells her the garages don’t usually stock these, and she may have to go to a camping car dealership. She says she’s going to try the super U or supermarket first, and she may be lucky.

This gives us the momentum to get up and go explore the old city of Carcassone, the 12^th century cité near us, and within the larger modern Carcassone.

It is completely walled, with towers and an ancient cathedral, and full of tourist shops, and places selling the local food, including Cassoulet – a type of stew with sausage, duck, and white beans.

There are people dressed in medieval costume walking up the hill, and when we get there, they are all gathering to parade into the city.  A large number of them.

There are people dressed as knights of the round table (Templers),

and musicians, playing things that sound a bit like bagpipes,

and folk wearing the scallop shell, (like the chap wearing red) which designates them as Christian pilgrims,

and there are those dressed in turbans with Turkish/Iranian appearance,

and others who pass as peasants, as well as the well dressed upper classes, all from the times of the crusaders. Carol says they were probably all peasants really.

Some musicians play a sort of bagpipe, with the bag made from a whole sheep or perhaps a pig’s skin, the legs plugged with wood.

Later we see archers, swordsmen, and knights in chain mail or armour. There must be some kind of meet for the clubs and guilds that these historical characters belong to. After a long amble around the old city, we taste some local wine, and then go and see their tents, set out in the moat around the walls. 

The archers shoot at their targets, while a couple of peasants hold the crowd back with long stakes.

A man is making repairs to chain mail armour, using a modern pair of pliers!

He first winds wire around a sort of crank, and then cuts them into circles, and replaces broken links.

Each circle moves independently but is joined to four others.

There are leather workers, and wood workers, and a blacksmith, as well as other artisans of long past crafts. It makes for a very interesting day. Carcasson is a fairy tale city, most beautifully preserved.

I buy a book about the Cathars, the religion that was persecuted and suppressed by the Templers and Catholics. Not much is known beyond what was confessed and extracted by torture, before the heretics were burned at the stake. They rejected the Roman catholic church and the pope, clearly not a thing you got away with in the 1200’s.

I am left wondering what it is about lovely places, like Carcassonne, that have such bloody pasts, and are now tourist spots. How different faiths had such power and influence to inflict torture and war on another seemingly innocent and simpler Christian faith, putting them to death in imaginatively awful ways. Who were the fanatics, and extremists, then?

My legs are all walked out by 3pm and we take a rest in the van, with our feet up, before a cup of tea. It is overcast and cooler today, and we were comfortable in coats again.

Sunday 20/10/2013 - Tuesday

On to Duilhac sous Peyrepertuse, Cathar country

We wanted to get away from Carcassone before 8am to save another €5. Unfortunately it was dark and raining, and I couldn’t see much, looking for the place to dump my waste water before setting off. I took a wrong turn in the car park and then tried to get out. I reversed into an enormous rock. First bit of real damage to the van, the back driver’s side bumper has a nice big crack in it. We only saw the damage later when it was light and I stopped because I could see a little bit of bumper in the mirror, flapping away. Another little job for the roll of duct tape.

We were soon on a very scenic road heading south through the mountains – this time the road was a little better, and the views were just spectacular. Sometimes the road was cut right out of the mountain. A bit scary when the van is 3m in height.

When we eventually stopped in Duilhac, everything was just perfect, except no electricity. We took the bike out and went up the hill to the ruined chateau of Peyrepertuse. 

We had a good walk around and there were a few people gliding in a kind of hanglider/kiteglider – anyway they were riding the thermals around the chateau.

This bit of France is the whole reason for coming in a motorhome. I am quite certain that a year of research on the internet and asking all your friends where to go in France would not unearth this little gem. Perhaps I won’t tell you any more, as the secret might get out. You can stay in the village of Duilhac, under one of the castles on the hill,

or in the nearby village of Cucugnan, with its charming windmill in a gîte and get fed cheap local food in the bargain, for very little and explore a magical bit of France.

The mountain scenery is spectacular, and the climbs to the peaks great exercise, with panoramic views almost to the Med, to the Spanish Pyrenees, and north almost to Carcassone.  

The motorbike always got the best parking spot!

Peyrepertuse, and nearby Quéribus, are hilltop castle ruins; there are 5 such castles, on peaks south of Carcassone, which controlled all the territory in the disputed Spanish border until surrendered to the King of France (Saint Louis), after the crusades.

It is no wonder the area has been fought over; it is such lovely country. If you like walking in the hills, or if you like a bit of religious history, or if you like to wander around and look at great priced art and pottery, or wine tasting, or biking, or hang-gliding. Ok you get the point; it is lovely here. Don’t tell everyone. You can even do white water-rafting.

Before we left we had discovered the pure mountain water pouring out of the rock into a series of drills, where the locals refill their plastic water bottles. Such joy to have Evian quality water for free, and it comes out of the rock chilled.

We discovered that different vines not only have different coloured grapes, but their foliage changes to autumn leaves at different rates and in different hues. The autumn colours are spectacular. And they were collecting the autumn harvest.

The wine tasting was a hoot, and after a half glass of these five wines I was clearly not really sober enough to ride a motorcycle. But one must get home, carrying a wife and 4 bottles of wine, and sundry other stuff; binoculars (a must), camera, discarded motorcycle jackets, and gloves. But an experience I wouldn’t miss for the world. (Wife was also pissed but we both stayed on)

Eventually we have to leave, we can only manage 2-3 days without electricity to recharge batteries, as we are not yet equipped with such things as solar panels, to manage without it.

Tuesday 22/10/2013

Collioure, on the Med again

Today we took a serious wrong turn, ignoring Mrs Garmin. She didn’t scold, or offer any alternatives. But our trip to Spain was a little unexpected, and we had to go a few miles over the border and back along a very windy mountainous road to get back to Collioure. And La Jonquera is not even vaguely French. So anyway the drive into Collioure is also quite awesome.

I tried my best to obey Mrs Garmin, and then the Chinese-American Mrs Stephen Hawkins. But even I know when to take note of signs that prohibit anything over 3.5 tonnes or wider than 2 metres, and turn around.

After parking up in a site that does have everything, toilets, electricity, water, waste-water disposal, security, level site, and a view, we went out to see the sea.

By the by, I should mention the difficulty I have with rating French toilets. I thought that I could do it with a five star system but it doesn’t work. Here’s my concept:

1* basic squatting bog, with a flush that wets the whole cubicle, including the feet

2* a ceramic or stainless steel pedestal but no seat, and no wash basin, no toilet roll

3* a bog pedestal, and a seat that lifts

4* all the above, and with toilet paper

5* all the above, and with a wash basin and soap

This sounds logical n’est pas? Only it doesn’t work. I have lost count of the toilets with no seat, but with a wash basin and soap.  So 2* can actually be very good. Or maybe a seat, and bog on the floor and walls. So 3* much worse than 2*. Or the 5* where the wash basin has been removed – yes we saw it in the photograph of the site, and when we got there the basin had been removed, but the water supply was still intact, tap on one side of the wall and a hose on the other. This therefore requires two people to fill a water tank or water carrier! Or, as in Carcassone, advertised as having a WC, and there it is ladies and gents, and also two solely for bus drivers, but the whole thing is locked and you can’t get in.

Carol got annoyed with me here for telling you about rubbish, and took over the photo editing, her choice of photos from Carcassone to the coast today!

 24/10/2013

Just been looking at houses with an estate agent in villages just inland from Collioure, about 10-20km in and nestling under the mountains, and will come and see some more tomorrow or Saturday perhaps.

Lovely just riding around, and we did stick a toe into the water at the beach too.

Temperatures of around 27-28' - perfect.