Sarlat day 2 / Rocamadour

For the first time, this morning, my Blackberry crashed overnight, which meant no alarm. (We left our travel alarm at home and have found my blackberry to be the only available timepiece and alarm clock.) Nonetheless, activity on the square awakened us at about the right time. (Thus the advantages of sleeping with open windows – only we didn't get up right away, and I fell back asleep till 10. I hadn't slept well – it was hot in the room.)

We got up and had breakfast – just coffee for Eric, the full hotel breakfast for me. I recalled why I usually eschew hotel breakfasts. They seem like they'll be nice enough, but they are never what I want. I seem to need to relearn this every trip.

Then we headed out toward Rocamadour, which is recommended for a full day trip by the Michelin guide. On the way we got a bug in the car... a bee.. a big bee... a bee the size of a woman's thumb. (We saw a similarly-sized bee dead on the steps at Rocamadour; they must be local.) It was entirely alarming, and after letting out a strangled cry, I pulled over and we let the bee out the hatchback. Thank god it was hovering around the back window and not, for example, in my face. I handled it well, but can't promise I would have in more challenging circumstances. (I saw a statistic once about how many car accidents are caused per year by bees.)

Rocamadour is generally amazing on the level of Mont Saint Michel, but just a little less magical. Perhaps that's why it's less known – or perhaps it's that this region is a bit out of the way by comparison.

So here's the history as I can make it out: there is a valley gorge surrounded by high rocky cliffs and outcroppings, some of which form natural sheltering caves. There was a hermit who lived under a rocky outcropping, known now as St. Amadour, though his original identity is uncertain. (The Michelin guide, which is written somewhat oddly and without any irony, suggests he is most likely Zaccheus, husband of St. Veronica; the two had to leave Palestine after Jesus' crucifixion and go to the Périgord. I don't know... central France seems like an odd choice for one fleeing Palestine, which is pretty far away. There's a similar theory about Mary Magdalene.) The hermit died and quite a while later (I suppose 1,000 years later), his perfectly preserved body was found buried under the rock. This is understood as a sign of sainthood, and so a chapel was built there, and then a convent. It became a major pilgrimage site (being on the way from Paris to Santiago de Compostela probably helped). Below the multi-chapeled "cité religieuse" grew a small village to serve pilgrims; above it, atop the plateau, was built a castle and ramparts for its protection (this being the area of the 100 years' war). Penitants came to Rocamadour to be absolved of their sins (having most likely been sent their by a ecumenical or lay tribunal, rather than being seized by a personal need). They travelled in special clothing that they stripped off in the lower village in order to climb the steps to the cité religieuse in nothing but a shirt and chains.

The cliff is sloped so that the village sits both below and next to the cité religieuse. Just above the 2 and 3 story buildings of the village sits the street level of the square outside the cité religieuse. (These days, of course, there are elevators, though we did not take them – to my personal satisfaction, though my legs are sore now.) The original sheltering rocky outcropping is a part of the ceiling of the first chapel; the larger central chapel features one wall that is simply the cliff face. The architecture is gothic, and I've seen many gothic churches; it's odd to see it blending into the natural wall of a cliff. Above the cité religieuse by several stories is the château, reachable only by a winding path next to the cité religieuse. The path features stations of the cross; on a hot day like today its chief charm is that it's cool and refreshing (a charm more or less undone by the heat one feels as a result of the climb).

At the top you can visit the ramparts by slipping a 2-euro coin into a machine next to a gate. The ramparts are vertiginous and I didn't get far, but Eric took the whole tour and I photographed him from afar. (The cliff and château are so high that the view hardly improves from the ramparts.)

We had arrived initially at the top, by car – the Michelin guide recommends taking in the view of the town from above, first, and I'd agree. It orients you and helps you to understand the whole thing. Then we drove down to park at the floor of the valley, below the village. A few staircases led up to the main street of the village – of course there's only one street; where would another one be? The town hugs a steep incline! The town is currently all restaurants and shops of the tourist variety. Near one end is the "great stairway" when penitents began their slow climb. At the top is a small square by the entrance to the cité religieuse. There's a hotel and brasserie there with a terrace overlooking the valley, and we decided to eat there. (It was that or go back down the damn stairs.)

I started with a salade verte aux noix (tasty, simple, and local), and then had a carpaccio de magret de canard – and oh my goodness this was good. It had a honey-inflected sauce and had some sort of finely-chopped fruit, as well as pink peppercorns, coriander, and some other seasonings. It was so marvelously fragrent! A good counterpart to the duck. Eric had the salade rocamadour, which was salad, walnuts, and toasted cabécou cheese – a local goat cheese (also delicious). We also had coffee to fortify ourselves for the uphill journey. Breaking the trip up that way did make it easier, though.

Up around the chapels we saw a tour group of teenagers (some British, some American) led by an American woman who was explaining the history of the place. After the chapels we headed up to the château and ramparts, and then back down. On the way down the great stairway, we saw the woman who'd the tour group, accompanied by 3 or 4 of her charges, climbing the stairs slowly on their knees, apparently saying a prayer at each step. Unlike the traditional penitents, they wore their ordinary clothes, rather than just a shirt and chains. At the base of the steps was apparently the rest of the group. What sort of group was this? Religious tours? If so, why weren't they all climbing the steps?

I've been to other pilgrimage sites, and it always feels weird to be a tourist where there are pilgrims; I imagine it also feels weird to be a pilgrim where there are tourists. I don't know... I've never been a pilgrim.

After a refreshing Perrier on another terrace, and some ice cream, we headed back to the car. We decided not to try to do anything else that day, though there was time. This way we'd arrive back in Sarlat with time to explore a little more. I was loathe to simply retrace my steps, so I purposely headed off in the wrong direction (up the other side of the gorge) before turning toward Sarlat. This turned out to be a lot of fun! We were alone on narrow country roads, weaving along the verdant limestone gorges that make up the Causses area (a national park... and the name of the croque I'd had days ago in Paris).

Back in Sarlat we strolled further and saw things better that we'd seen before. We paused for a couple of beers, and then headed to dinner.

There are so many restaurants here that serve Périgourdais specialties, it's hard to chose. The guidebooks somehow seem not entirely trustworthy. What to do? We selected a place with outside seating on a cool square outside the main streets, because the menu looked good and it was a few degrees cooler than elsewhere. (It was hot again today.) Also, I'd been wanting an omelette aux cèpes (cèpes are a local mushroom the area is famous for).

The meal was disappointing, though not really bad. I had medallions of pâté with foie gras in the center (good, actually, but small), followed by the omelette aux cèpes (which suffered from being an omelette and being stuffed with mushrooms, particularly in large chunks – but honestly, what did I think I was getting? It's like some form of temporary insanity). The desert that came with my menu was crème caramel, and I traded it with Eric for another gâteau de noix, which was pretty good – different from last night, but neither better nor worse. Eric got a larger, multicourse menu: terrine de foie gras de canard with a local sweet wine, Monbazillac (good – how can you go wrong with foie gras?); croustillade de st. jacques (also pretty tasty, actually; st. jacques are scallops); confit de canard (a far cry from last night's, but still good as always); a toasted Cabécou (also tasty); and the aforementioned dessert. I helped Eric eat his meal since mine was so much smaller and his was more than he needed. We had a red Bergerac to drink which was unremarkable. Also, the nice little square turned out to have gnats, though not enough to be terrible.

One nice moment: a few tables over was a family with a toddler and a baby, plus a grandmother. The mother (and grandmother) were American, but the father seemed to be at least partly French. His English was unaccented, but he spoke French with the kids. Anyway, at one point, the baby was in a stroller, off to the side (where it might fall asleep, but it had been fussing). The father went off, sat by the baby, and sang quietly. So there we sat in a square in a medieval town on a warm evening, and under all the ambient noise – people talking, dishes clinking, things happening in the distance – under all that was a soft, French lullaby.

We returned to the hotel, not feeling like having another nightcap. Thunderstorms were threatening, anyway: lightening flashed in the distance. The room was warm, but when the storms finally hit, it cooled down. They've since passed and now it's bedtime.

Labels: france, journal

posted by Tony at 10:06 PM