After leaving the marshes of the Marais Poitevin, we went north and came to a place with the unlikely name of Airvault! It was very grey and a bit rainy, and seeing that we had to both fill the drinking water tank and empty the other one, we decided to stop at a caravan park. It happened to be run by an English family and it was nice to be able to chat to them without having to think twice about what you were going to say, and how, but it was extremely expensive and apart from being full of whingeing children, it was really rather dirty. I’m sorry, folks, but we have now had quite a few months experience of campers and their children and have decided that the French are the best behaved. The Dutch are the noisiest and don’t put their children to bed until the adults want to go to sleep; the Germans shout a lot but are silent from early evening on, and the English children whine and fight, all the time! However, in spite of all the bad things we thought and have said about the place, we did manage to get a huge load of washing done and dried which was a relief.
The next morning after checking out, we had a quick walk around Airvault which is quite quaint, and has a wonderful old Romanesque church with lots of special features. We had planned to go further East, but after picking up a pamphlet in the Tourist Office, we drove South instead, to a small campsite near a tiny village called Cognac la Foret. The weather which had been threatening all day, broke that night and the next day we awoke to pouring rain. We cancelled all plans for the day and spent it reading in our cosy home. That night, because we had thought that we would have been out all day, we had booked a meal in the camp restaurant, so at the appointed time we presented ourselves and were seated at a long table with 18 other people, most of whom were Dutch. When they discovered that we were South African, we were bombarded with all sorts of questions, and offered all sorts of advice on traveling in Europe. It ended up being a very jolly evening with lots of laughs as we tried to understand their Dutch, while they tried to understand our Afrikaans.
The next morning was still a bit grey, but we left anyway and went a few kilometers to Oradour sur Glane. This little village was the scene of an absolutely ghastly and senseless massacre on the 10th June 1944, and the entire population was wiped out. Since then, the whole village has been left as a memorial. No-one is quite sure what prompted the massacre, but at about the same time, two German officers were caught by Resistance fighters. They were taken prisoner, but one later escaped and it was possibly this officer who informed the SS that the village of Oradour sur Glane was involved. On the morning of the 10th June, German troops surrounded the village while other soldiers rounded up the villagers. They separated men from women and herded them into various locations. The men went into a large barn and a garage workshop, while the women and children were taken to the church. At a command, the soldiers began firing into the crowd until no-one was left standing, then they set fire to each and every building in the village, so that those who were wounded but not dead were burnt alive. The next day, they returned and collected up as much as they could of the charred remains and tipped everything into a mass grave. 642 people perished, all of them civilians. Today the village stands as it was after the fires went out. There are notices asking one to walk the streets in silence and effect is very eerie and very sobering. I’m glad we took the trouble to make the detour, but was quite a sad visit.
On again, and this time going eastwards, we passed through Limoges and stopped at a small village on the outskirts of the town where a warehouse advertised itself as selling Limoges porcelain direct to the public at factory prices. We spent about an hour just ooh-ing and aah-ing at the beautiful things, but even factory prices are way beyond our budget so we came away empty-handed. Anyway we were headed for Nevers, which also has a porcelain heritage, so we thought we might look there instead.
At Nevers, we had a wonderful campsite with a view across the river (Loire) to the town. In the morning, it was raining again, but the weather forecast had promised the day would clear so we walked into town anyway and even took pictures in the rain. The whole town is just filled with beautiful old buildings, some from the 13th century, beautifully decorated and, as ever, with spectacular displays of flowers. Eventually, tired of puddling around in the rainy, cobbled streets, we turned for home and were about halfway across the massive bridge over the Loire, when the clouds suddenly cleared and the sun came out! Oh, and I forgot to say that it was only late the previous evening that we discovered that the following day was a Public Holiday, so during our walk around town, all the shops were closed. But we did see some Nevers porcelain in a shop window and didn’t mind that the shop was closed. If anything, it was even more expensive than the Limoges china and not nearly as fine.
Still going eastwards and a little north, we headed for Vezelay, a hilltop town dominated by the 12th century Basilica St. Madeleine. As the countryside roundabout is relatively flat and very forested, the first sight of the town comes as quite a surprise. I’m sure that the folk of mediaeval times must have felt rather over-awed by the size of the church, but I imagine that was part of the reason for building it so enormous. It wasn’t an optical illusion either – the building is quite massive, but enhanced by the fact that the buildings around are not big at all and it is on the top of quite a steep hill. The buildings which border the narrow twisting street up to the church are almost all occupied by artists, with a few shops and restaurants in between. However, the whole commercial angle has been kept very low-key, with no obtrusive signs or advertisements and one gets the feeling of walking through a pleasant mediaeval town – with modern conveniences!
When we had climbed the cobbled street right to the top, we found that a service in the church was nearing its conclusion, so we quietly let ourselves in at the back. The priest was so far away up at the altar that we could hardly see him, but the acoustics were perfectl (Yes! Yes! I know he had a microphone) and we sat and enjoyed the music played on a real pipe-organ while the collection was taken, before the people filed out and we could wander around at will. While the organ was playing, the double main doors were opened by a young monk and we were amazed at the size of them – at least 5 metres high, but then, the nave is a soaring 18 metres high with a wonderful airiness filled with golden light. As we have so often found, these buildings may well be centuries old but the designers and builders of the time knew a great deal about making the best use of available light.
No comments:
Post a Comment