Farewell Carcassonne Southern France
Carcassonne, the old encircled city of fairytale proportions is our final destination while here in The Languedoc. Souvenir shops and restaurants open for business yet few tourists about, we are thankful for sunny 14c weather.
Our travels here in the Languedoc have extended in all directions from Carcassonne.
Our travels here in the Languedoc have extended in all directions from Carcassonne.
This Patrimony site is often viewed from roundabouts as we drive past enroute to smaller more remote villages. Today our last travel day in this region it is fitting to pay personal respect to this monumental site and to its turbulent history.
Of the many books we have read about this region in Cathar Country, it is Kate Mosse’s historical novels that weave their threads into our imagination. Carcassonne’s dramatic stone presence gives grounding to tales inexplicably gruesome yet offers strange hope of endurance, evidence of the so many who clung to its security while living out their lives here over centuries of persecution.
The strange beauty of stone the worn rounded arms of defence walls and wizard capped turrets, must have offered some comfort. Slitted windows, narrow doorways and cobbled dark lanes it is all a wonder, a great theatre for a human spirit who lived within these fortified walls.
Enter in with me through the Christmas festooned Narbonne gate. Enjoy a tour and hopefully your imagination and curiosity will inspire an appreciation for our enduring human capacity to create a very thrilling life.
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