This morning we came down to the formal dining room for an excellent traditional French breakfast-- croissants, many types of jams (all made by Monique, the owner), cured ham, salami, ambert cheese, st.nectaire cheese, ceilloux cheese and st.dieu (the next town over) cheese.
We were so sad to leave, but we had much more to do! On our drive out of the Domaine de Gaudon I shot this picture with the Domaine in the far distance
Monsieur had suggested an abbey to stop at on our way to Le Puy en Velay, the 11th century
Le Chaise Dieu Abbey. This was in a tiny town but the abbey was really special.
The tapestries you see in this photo above the pews are from 1501 are in excellent condition
One of the tapestries up close
This abbey had a very special relic: a 15th century fresco of the "Dance of Death" or the "Danse Macabre"
From the abbey's website:
Death was an everyday occurrence in the 15th century as the Black Death and War particularly the One Hundred Years War had decimated the population which was reduced by fifty percent between 1350 and 1450. Because of this the church focused on preparing for death as very important and worthy of reflection. The main aim of the Dance of Death, which was initially illustrated in the cemetery of the Holy Innocents in Paris at the beginning of the 15th century, was to display the uniformity of all people faced with death and its inevitability. This is shown by emaciated beings needing something from the so-called powerful of this world whether clerics or laymen as they are dying.
We left the abbey and drove further south, passing the town of Polignac, France
Just past Polignac was Le Puy en Velay, a starting point for the Camino de Santiago (The Way of St. James) in Spain. We were still in the volcanic region of central France and so there were some very interesting formations, including this 10th century cathedral
Can you imagine building this on top of this volcanic rock?
Le Puy en Velay has a giganitic statue of Mary and baby Jesus
As we drove further south we entered the Parc National des Cevennes. I love National Parks here in the U.S. so I was eager to see one in France. We drove through the Gorges du Tarn, a gorge cut by the Tarn River.
A very narrow road!
As we left the Gorges du Tarn we drove into Millau, the town with the famous Millau Viaduct. I thought we were going to get to drive over it, but we took a wrong turn. That ended up being better because we realized it was better to see the highest bridge in the world than actually drive over it
I also noticed that the French Department of Transportation is a Tennessee Vols fan!
We finally arrived at our hotel in Beziers, for our southern France part of our trip. We decided to stay in the Languedoc region as opposed to Provence because Provence is so touristy! I have also been to Provence before so I didn't really want to go there again.
Our hotel was
Le Clos de Maussanne. This used to be a convent and 20 nuns lived here and grew vegetables to give to the poor. The hotel was very nice, but after staying at an amazing B&B the night before, it seemed a little plain. The hotel was very Mediterranean and quite simple, but it went with the area.
Again, the owner invited us for tea after we got settled and we were greeted with this!
Napoleon, a great dane! Napoleon lived in the attached restaurant along with two cats
I am not kidding, the French do not seem to care if their pets live among their eating establishments, and I loved it! Napoleon was with us everytime we ate. We were again the only guests in this B&B so they cooked especially for us. The owners asked us what we wanted for supper, fish or lamb. Since I definitely don't eat fish I had the lamb (which I don't eat either, but I'll eat that before fish!) They ended up serving us scallops or proscuitto to start, lamb, ratatouille, a cheese plate and then chocolate cake! We enjoyed it very much, despite the fact that we had no idea how much it was going to cost since the restaurant just opened for us and there was no menu. We didn't find out until we checked out but I think it ended up being about 100 Euro.
To see all of our pictures from Day 5, click
here.
