Thursday 17th April 2025
Today we had a change of plan. It had been our intention to visit a town called Montauban. When I read about it in my Rough Guide it seemed as if it had no great highlights and it’s claim to fame seems to be that it is yet another town asserting to be the “first Bastide”. Instead we decided to head for another pretty hilltop village in the Lot valley.
On our drive through the French countryside we witnessed an age old custom, which I fear may be dying out – two elderly gentlemen openly urinating on the roadside, while a woman looked on embarrassed, I think.
Something not so traditional has also been catching our eyes and that is village roadsigns turned upside down! We passed through dozens of villages where this had occurred. The signs were not vandalised but properly and professionally mounted on their original post, but inverted! When I had a chance I Googled it and found it is part of a farmers protest to draw attention the the uncertainty they are facing.
We finally pulled up at a beautiful aire (44.4708, 1.6808) near the village of Saint-Cirq-Lapopie. We were able to park Basil facing lovely view over the river Lot. The aire was €12 and it reminded me that Aire’s are getting fairly pricey. One reason for this is electric payment points which have proliferated and I suppose when people are paying by credit card the Communes feel they can ask for a few more euros.
Saint-Cirq-Lapopie is situated on top of a 100 metre cliff overlooking the river Lot. It is another delightful medieval village with no real modern development, save for tourism. Apparently it won some sort of competition on French television and ever since has been receiving up to 400,000 visitors a year.
Luckily for us, at this time of year the numbers are not that great. To reach the village is quite a climb. We found a rocky track which took us half way to the top and we completed the walk on the cobbled streets.
In my opinion, although well worth a visit if you are in the area, is not as enjoyable to visit as Cordes, this maybe because I like a bit of characterful dereliction!
Friday 18th April 2025
At last a day of unbroken sunshine. We drove Basil through some picturesque countryside to Flower Camping La Sagne (44.8262,1.2412 €17 ACSI) which is located on the River Dordogne. It was our intention to stay here a number of nights and use it as a base to explore the numerous sights in the area, but we are not totally enamoured of the site, so we may move.
No sooner had we pitched Basil than Sarah was off to the washing machine with our accumulated dirty clobber. I just sat and soaked up the sun.
Saturday 19th April 2025
We awoke to yet more rain! The nearby town of Sarlat-la-Canéda holds a big market on Saturdays, so we had to decide whether to brave the rain or visit Sarlat on another day. We’re British so a bit of rain didn’t put us off. All that remained was the problem of parking Basil in a town on a busy market day.
I picked out a likely spot on my go to app: Park4Night, but when we reached Sarlat we realised it was not going to be that simple. Every parking space for cars or motorhomes anywhere near the market was full. Added to this was the stress of manoeuvring Basil’s not inconsiderable bulk through narrow streets thronged with market goers.
Eventually we decided to head for a car park a little further out of the centre and much to our surprise stumbled across a half empty free car park. Furthermore, when we looked at the route to the centre it was only a 10 minute walk.
Sarlat’s market is truly huge. There is a large section dedicated to largely locally produced food. Another area sells artisan crafts and apparently there is a third section, which we never located, selling clothes.
We spent an hour wandering through the market admiring both the produce and the lovely architecture of yet another unspoilt medieval town. Poor old Skye’s nose was in hyperdrive with so much meat and cheese on display. Many stallholders offer small samples to attract customers. I managed to get Skye a sample of ham and although she loved it she unfortunately didn’t have sufficient cash to follow through with a purchase!
After the market we briefly explored an uncrowded part of Sarlat and then headed back for a very soggy afternoon at the campsite.
