Owner:
squiz
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Member#: 1764 Location: Registered: 05-03-2006 Diary Entries: 60
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22nd September 2016
Mt. Biking: Sauliac sur Cele to St. Cirq Lapopie Wind Direction: Wind Stength: Surf / Sea State: Air Temperature: Sea Temperature: Weather: Sunny and hot :) Max Speed: 24.37 (knots - unless stated otherwise) Distance Covered: 22 miles (Nautical Miles - unless stated otherwise)
Wednesday 21st September – Sightseeing and travel
A beautiful sunny morning with the mist just hovering over the river. We
left our spot after breakfast – enjoying the engine starting with one
turn of the key – bliss!! We left Argentat and headed on down to the
Gorges de la Cere, another star on our wonder map! The roads to get there
and down into the gorge were a bit mad but we made it with no problems. We
again said that you wouldn’t want to bring a great big camper down here
but then as we parked and started our walk one went across the bridge!!
You have to hope he didn’t meet anything on the way up!! We had a nice
walk across the river and round the side of the small barrage. The path
took you through woods and along the side of a railway line which we were
unsure was still being used. We arrived at a point where you had to decide
to go up the steps to the railway line as it came out of a tunnel or under
it via a completely dark footpath tunnel. We had just started to climb the
steps when a train blew its hooter and came out of the tunnel so that was
the answer to that question!! We decided to give the spooky dark tunnel a
miss and walk back the way we had come, detouring up to the small station
to have a look at the walks board. Nothing took our fancy so we got back
in the van and headed up the other side of the steep gorge. We saw lots of
buzzards today, flying and just sitting in fields. Also a sparrowhawk and
a red kite. We stopped at an Aldi in St. Cere and got some tuna steaks for
tea!! Stopped at Assier for our lunch near a small moat style pond and
when we drove off discovered a really good chateau just round the corner!
When we got to Livernon our map was showing several Dolmans and unusually
the town had actually signposted how to get to two of them! They were
really good ones and both had a small car park. The large Dolman we had to
walk 0.2km to and the Menhir was actually in the car park. As we got to
this part of the journey the terrain changed and there were huge white
cliffs emerging with houses clinging onto them. The village of St. Sulpice
was all clinging to the cliff and very quaint. We stopped at Mercilhac sur
Cele in the Cele valley and had a cuppa by the weir on the river. We
walked along the river round the mill and through a tiny arch in the
ancient wall to discover the ancient Abbey. The centre of the Abbey is
still standing and being used as the village church but the outside is
crumbling away. Had a wander around the rest of the village then back in
the van for only a few miles before we found the perfect spot to park at
Sauliac sur Cele. It is a small picnic area on the side of the fast
flowing shallow river. On the opposite bank hidden mostly by trees is the
most enormous chateau which is built on a great big lump of rock! It looks
in good condition but nobody appeared to be at home! I did my exercises in
the sun because today has been a really sunny day all day and we sat and
read our books until the sun went behind the big chateau. The tuna was
delicious and so cheap!!
Thursday 22nd September – Bike ***** Sauliac sur Cele to St. Cirq Lapopie
– sunny & hot – 22 miles 4 ½ miles out and top speed 24.37 knts
A glorious but chilly start to the day. The sun doesn’t really come up
here until after 8 a.m. and our thermometer in the van said 9 degrees!
Still the sun was out so exercises outside, Mag with her fleece and socks
on but I waited until the sun came over the surrounding cliffs! We were
treated to a wonderful display from 2 kingfishers darting along the river
with the sun catching their beautiful blue backs:) We continued to watch
them while we ate our breakfast but then two people on bikes came and sat
just where they were hunting so they disappeared and we got the bikes off.
We cycled along the road through the valley of the Celle river and were
treated to the village of Cabrerets where all the houses are built into the
cliffs, including a mill house which was just like a fairy grotto with
water and moss all around. Apparently the original houses were right on
the river bank until the late 1800s but they then decided to build the road
so knocked them all down and built new ones further back which means into
the cliff! We were taking photos on the bridge and started talking to a
lady who had come up from a pleasure boat on the river Lot with her friends
and they were visiting from the Caribbean!! They were going to an English
speaking tour of the caves – Grottes de Pech Merle just outside the
village where 25,000 year old cave drawings are housed. We continued our
journey down the valley until the river Cele joins the Lot. The actual
place where they join wasn’t on show as you had to disappear through a
road tunnel at that point. We continued to the bridge at Tour de Faure and
over it to start the big climb up to St. Cirq Lapopie. We visited this
quaint town last time we were here but left our bikes at the bottom of the
hill and walked up! This time we pushed all the way up and wheeled our
bikes round the narrow streets, past the Italian guided tour and up to the
church. We then went up onto the ruins at the top of the village before
enjoying the big steep hill down :) We went to the river bank in search of
the lock where we had seen two pleasure boats go through while we were up
in the village. We found it with no problem and were impressed to notice a
free camper aire just up the river :) We ate our lunch sitting on the lock
wall feeding the fish bits of bread. The only boat that came through while
we were there was a couple of carp fishermen in a small motor boat towing
their rubber dinghies behind them. We returned over the bridge at Tour de
Faure and looked out for a small turning on the right which we thought
looked like a good place to return to the van and make our outing a
circular route. We found it and then started the very long upward journey
through pine trees to a plateau at the top. Even the plateau was up and
down though so it was quite hard work. We stopped when we thought we had
got to the highest point and had a rest, watching literally hundreds of
butterflies fly past. The road disintegrated into a track in the middle
and got quite rough but it then linked up with a proper road coming the
other way. We didn’t really start a good descent until we were nearly
back to Sauliac sur Cele where we are staying. But we were treated to the
great sight of the cliffs surrounding the village coming into view together
with the houses up above where we are staying. We hadn’t realised there
were quite so many but were not tempted to start another push up hill to
investigate further!! We whizzed down the remaining hill and over the
bridge (which we are pleased to see because we were unsure as to whether
there even was a bridge here!) and then the short ride back to the van. We
did over 22 miles and were out 4 ½ hours. It turned out to be a hot day
in the end around 27 degrees and we barely laid our bikes down before
walking into the river to cool off. I plunged right in and nearly died –
it was really really cold and what I thought was quite a shallow stretch of
the river ended up being really deep and I couldn’t touch the bottom!!
Mag went in up to her waist and watched the various species of fish swim
around her – by keeping still she saw lots :) My testing of the water
was enough to put her off going any further!! We spent the rest of the
afternoon reading and had an ‘everything in the fridge omelette’ for
tea. There were several visitors to the car park and there are a couple of
lads who look like they might sleep in their car a little further over from
us so we might have company!!
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