Doing Dordogne - Day 9 - 15 km Canoe Paddle

Wednesday, September 14th

      The big adventure for the day today is a 15 km canoe excursion on the Dordogne River from Vitrac downstream back to Beynac. Fueled with a breakfast of muesli and cafe-creme, we joined Charlie and Ellen from our travel group, and walked across the street from the hotel to the canoe office. The sign in the window specified that they expected you to arrive a minimum of twenty minutes before the 10 o'clock first departure. It was only 9:30, so we were not surprised to find that the office was not open yet. Two other women who wanted to rent canoes arrived about a quarter of the hour. However, when nobody had shown up by 9:55 I began to worry that we were supposed to have showed up at Vitrac instead of meeting here in Beynac.

      I scurried back across the street to the hotel office, and asked the helpful lady at the desk to call the reservation number for the canoes to see if we were in the wrong place. She assured me that someone would be arriving to pick us up promptly at 10:00. Sure enough, it was 9:59 when a small bus whipped into the parking lot motioning to the six of us to climb aboard.

     It was about a 25 minute ride on tree-lined country roads to the riverside canoe livery at Vitrac. An Australian hippy-type guy gave us a cheery greeting, and issued us life jackets and paddles. He slung a couple of canoes to slide down the river bank. Charlie and Ellen were the first to shove off, and Jane and I followed only about a minute later.

     Paddling leisurely downstream with the gentle current, we caught up with our fellow river travelers. We passed campgrounds and other canoe rental places along the way as we drifted down the Dordogne.

     In some places the banks were low, and flat farmland and vineyards stretched off to rolling hills in the near distance. The river meandered closer to the hills and the low banks became chalky cliffs. 

     We paddled past the Chateau Castelnaud high on a promontory above us where we could see the reconstructed silhouettes of several trebuchets, looking as if they were ready to hurl skull-sized boulders at us far below. 

      There were openings and caves visible as we approached the village Roc de Gageac. Sandwiched between the river and the vertical cliffs, the buildings and houses almost seem stacked on top of each other, and those that nestle up against the cliffs used the cliff itself as the rear wall.

      High above the last of the houses, a steep stairway juts out from the cliff, ascending to an opening halfway to the top where you can see masonry walls have been erected. We had read that village inhabitants long ago had used ropes, pulleys, and ladders to evacuate people and possessions to these high retreats in times of threat.

      We pulled the two canoes up on the gravel bank opposite the village, and sat on our life jackets while we shared sandwiches, fruit, and some wine between us.

      With only 8 km to travel, we slid the canoes back into the water and continued our downstream adventure. Rounding a curve we spotted Chateau Feynac, an imposing hilltop castle currently American owned.

      Another half hour down the river, traveling in the company of quite a few other canoeists we approached a riffle where much of the span of the river shallowed to a few inches, cascading with small chuckling sounds down across the underlying gravel.

      The six canoes in front of us all paddled vigorously toward the right where there appeared to be a spot on the inside of the river curve where the water was a bit smoother. IF I had used my past experience instead of assuming that those ahead of us had spotted an opening I could not yet see, I would have steered toward the outside of the river bend where water is almost always deeper. In a matter of moments I felt the bottom of the canoe scraping the rounded rocks beneath us, and seconds later we ground to a complete stop, joining all those other canoes that had preceded us.

      After hunching and crunching, and shoving on the bottom to no avail with our paddles it was obvious that I'd have to get out and wade, dragging the canoe across the shallow patch to deeper water. That was not difficult, but I had soggy shoes for the rest of the trip.

      The brochure had indicated that the trip from Vitrac to Beynac would take two and a half hours, but by the time we pulled the two canoes up on the ramp back at Beynac we had been four hours enroute.

      Bill and Miriam happened to be looking over the upper wall as we stowed our life jackets and paddles, and we posed as Bill took a picture of us with Charlie and Ellen before saying good-by to them.  

      After retreating to the room for a short late afternoon siesta (yes, that's a Spanish tradition, not French, but the principal applies well anywhere!), we rejoined Miriam and Bill for an excursion to Les Jardins Suspendu de Chateau Marquessac.

      Like other chateaux in the area, Marquessac occupies high ground overlooking the valley of the Dordogne and the river. Its grounds, however, stretch for more than three kilometers along a ridge. The elaborate topiary near the chateau, planted and sculpted in the 1800's had been neglected, overgrown, and virtually abandoned for many years, but in 2001 work began to trim the boxwoods back to their original strange, convoluted shapes. Today they fully restored. 

 

      Jane and I wandered up a roughly cobbled path away from the main gardens. Lavender and rosemary, trimmed to form a sinuous waving pattern on both sides of us as we climbed toward a high vista overlooking the river far below. We turned back at that point. Had it been earlier in the day we might have continued on through the woods along the ridge line to another belvedere at the edge of a cliff that commanded a view upsteam all the way to Roc de Gageac.

      The four of us headed back to Beynac, and descended the stairs to our favorite bistro to continue our new tradition of ordering scoops of ice cream or fruit sorbet to nibble while watching the sun drift low over the sparkling river.

Doing Dordogne - Day Seven

Monday, September 12th

      A fine mist was floating down from low-lying gray clouds this morning, and fog obscured the far side of the river and the hilltop behind the hotel. We ate a light breakfast in the hotel dining room: cafe au lait, granola, and a small glass of orange juice.

      Looking across the road, we could see small trailers arriving and canopies being set up along both sides of the parking lot next to the river...a much smaller version of the St. Cyprian Sunday market day. Bill, Miriam, Jane and I spent a little while ambling up one side for a hundred yards and back down the other.

     We bought three small 3" wheels of Rocamadour cheese for 60 cents each, one of goat-cheese and two of cow cheese, all of them very soft, almost gooey.

      Stashing the cheese, a couple of long, skinny loaves of crusty bread, and a couple of bottles of wine in the car, we drove east along the riverside highway toward the town of Sarlat.

      Sarlat is one of the towns of the Perigourd region known for pate-foi-gras, goose-liver-paste, considered a delicious delicacy. Miriam had read that somewhere near the middle of town was a statue of a goose, and she wanted her picture taken beside it, so we turned off the main road toward the old town center.

      Passing along the cobbled street we saw many old houses and stores crowding up against narrow sidewalks. Before long I saw ahead a sign blocking all traffic, and an arrow to the left announcing a divertisement...in other words a detour. The left turn was the only option, and it led right past another permanent sign indicating that this road did not allow vehicular traffic. I had no choice. As I drove cautiously along very narrow streets and made several tight turns on the indicated detour I had to be very careful of herds of pedestrians, ambling along. Like flocks of sheep, they parted only slowly and reluctantly as the car crept past.

      We came to an open square in the oldest part of town, where tourists and locals alike were shopping, walking, or sitting under large umbrellas in sidewalk cafes sipping coffee, heads turning to see the unexpected car passing through their exclusive domain. Still following the detour arrows, we completed our auto tour of the old town and found our way back to the main road, but never did spot the stone goose we had set out to find.

      With Bill consulting his maps and navigating again, we drove south from Sarlat to the town of Domme. Here the town location was plainly chosen with defense in mind. It is high on a very steep sided bluff. A circuitous road climbs the slope at an angle, turning sharply at the top to pass through a massive stone gate in the walls of the bastide, or fortress. 

     Many of the streets were so narrow that the car would just barely fit between the walls of the stone houses on either side. The center of the town is flat, however, and we found a temporary parking place so that we could look around a bit. Just a block away one side of an airy, tree lined plaza ends at a stone balustrade with a 200 foot drop below. There was a spectacular view out across the valley of the Dordogne. I paused for a few minutes to listen to a Belgian musician playing a hammered dulcimer.

      Back down the road from Domme, we traveled a short distance to the edge of the Dordogne River at Vitrac. Opening all of the car doors to enjoy the cool, gentle breeze we nibbled a leisurely lunch of crunchy french bread, Rocamadour cheese, crispy apples, and plastic cups of vin rose.

      There is a put-in spot here, and you can rent a canoe or kayak to paddle or float for 15 km down the river to Beynac. I'd like to do that!

      We continued our drive at 1:00 pm toward the grotto at Rouffignac to see some cave paintings. As we approached the town of Les Eyzies on the banks of the Moustier River we began to see tall sandstone cliffs, undercut by the river to make strange overhangs and narrow ledges. In many spots there were houses built beneath the overhanging rock and excavated back into the soft stone.

      We saw many openings high up on the cliffs that had obviously been cut out from the stone, and probably occupied long ago. At several places it was clear that people long ago had sheltered in these sheer cliffs and caves by pulling up their possessions, food, and even livestock, and then pulling up the ladders to take refuge from marauders traveling up the river.

      It was just an hour's drive to the cave at Rouffignac. We bought tickets for admission, and after a short wait joined others on a short walk into the wide, low mouth of the cavern. 

There we climbed up and settled onto narrow padded benches facing forward on two small open railroad cars.

      Our tour guide hopped on the front, and with a twist of the control lever started the electric engine train moving on the track along an ancient water-carved tunnel that descended gently into the darkness. A single bright bulb on the front lighted the tracks ahead and cast an indirect glow on the limestone walls around us, illuminating layers of strange, small bulbous formations that were suggestive of malformed growths of some exotic fungus.

      On and on we traveled, deeper and deeper, while the tour guide kept up a continuous patter of facts about the cave, the formations, the early inhabitants....all in French, of course, which meant that I understood perhaps every twentieth or thirtieth word... not enough to construct any consistent meaning.

      Far into the cave he pointed out places where cave bears had dug and scuffed out curved depressions as places to snooze away the cold winters. Nearby were lots and lots of parallel vertical marks on the walls where bears had stretched and scratched with their big claws.

      Somewhat over 3 km from the entrance we came to the first prehistoric cave drawings. Here cro-magnon men from 15,000 years ago had scratched beautifully executed outlines of wooly mammoths into the stone walls of the cave. 

 

      Farther along we came to animal drawings on the wall, done not in charcoal, but with pieces of manganese dioxide, used like black chalk. There were horses, several rhinoceros outlined, and a whole parade of mammoths.

Continuing even farther we came to a wider place with a low flat ceiling that was covered with the dark outlines of mammoths, bison, horses, and ibex. One horse was amazingly lifelike, drawn full scale. Most of the beautiful profiles were two to three feet from head to tail. 

     We stayed for awhile, marveling at the detail and accuracy of the beautiful drawings, and wondering about what might have motivated people 15,000 years ago to venture so far into darkness and danger, their way lit only by the dim glow of primitive oil lamps to draw these mysterious outlines.

By the time the electric train had made the long ascending trip back to the mouth of the cave a full hour had past, and the cool air outside the cave felt warm by comparison.

      We passed by a goose-farm on the way back, and stopped by the side of the road to watch as several hundred gray geese waddled over to the fence toward us. I guess they were expecting us to give each one of them their several-times-a-day force-feedings. I was happy to disappoint them!

      As we waited to get together with Bill and Miriam, Tish, Robert, and Nancy for dinner we saw two colorful hot air balloons, drifting a few hundred feet above the river, glowing brightly in the late afternoon sunlight.