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Published: November 8th 2009
La Cite,Carcassonne
The plan today is to visit the area known as La Cite,the first site used as a town in Carcassonne.
When we were driving into Carcassonne yesterday afternoon we caught a view of La Cite from the motorway and it looks a very interesting place with its rampart walls and witches hat roofs.
Today though has not dawned so good and in fact there is steady rain as get to prepare for the day.
But by the time we have finished breakfast the rain has stopped and the sky is clearing away to be at least partly cloudy.It is quite cool though and we are coming to appreciate that autumn is marching on.We haven’t yet seen a frost though and perhaps we have moved on fast enough when the places we have been in recently cooled down enough for one to occur.
It is a straightforward run through part of the city to reach La Cite on the other side of the river that divides the town.From the bridge over the river La Cite makes an imposing sight and one can understand why the city was never taken in a battle.It did change hands a couple of times in
its early days of the 12th century,first it was the fortification of the wealthiest local family only to fall after a long siege in a move by an army from Paris in a Papal encouraged takeover.
The castle and the fortifications fell into disrepair when the city moved to the other side of the river and it was only in the mid 1800’s that a long process was begun to restore it.Being among Europe’s largest walled fortifications it is understandable why the process took many years.
As we reached the castle and outer fortifications it started to rain again lightly so we took the tour hoping that by the time we finished the rain might have stopped again.
The tour includes a short film giving the history of La Cite and how painstakingly the place has been restored.Even today there is still research going on about how the massive fortifications were put together and added to over the years.Much of the research is being done using computer modelling and although this is probably a method used on many reconstructions today,this one was explained in easy to understand language as to how it is done and what the outcomes have been.
With two rampart walls and all its internal defences and a moat this place would have been nigh on impossible to take by force with the weapons available in the 12th century and it was only a siege where the occupants were eventually starved out.
The rain thankfully had stopped when we emerged from the tour of the ramparts and we strolled through the rest of the old city which has been turned into a tourist mecca except today there were few tourists!!There were so many restaurants,cafes and gift shops and one can imagine how busy they would be in the height of summer but on this rather cool and wet November day there weren’t many around.La Cite apparently has upwards of 3.5million visitors each year so the summer here must be jam packed!!
Before we headed back down to where the car was parked we took some time to wander around the cathedral.Of course after being on the this adventure for 7 months and having been inside so many cathedrals,churches etc that it is going to take something special to impress us over many of the others and this one didn't make that grade for us although the stain
glass was quite attractive.
We toyed with the idea of having a look at what is effectively the new part of Carcassonne and initially thought we would head for the airport to test out swapping HH for something that we think would be more reliable.But as we drove through the town we spotted the central car park and with the rain still holding off we decided to spend an hour wandering the narrow lanes.
As in La Cite there were few people downtown too so it made it easier getting about the narrow lanes and footpaths.We discovered a shop called”The Otago Shop”selling rugby gear.It wasn’t that it was unusual that there was a shop selling rugby gear in this rugby mad part of France but the name seemed out of place.The guy running it looked French and had he not been busy serving we might have gone and asked him the background to why it was called the Otago Shop.
With the rain threatening again we got back to HH and headed for the airport to track down the Hertz office and see what they could do to swap the car for another with a better clutch.They were very helpful
and changing the car was on.All we had to do was top it up with diesel and bring it back which we did.
The new car is an Opel,still a diesel and a 5 door but it is clearly larger than the Hyundai.So we have given the Opel the name of Ollie and he will be known hereafter as OO.He has a few more kilometres on the clock than the Hyundai but at least Gretchen feels she will be able to perform a hill start without leaving too much tyre on the road!!
It hasn’t been an overly active day but we have toured a fascinating castle and we have changed the car for one that we think will be more reliable.
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Rin
non-member comment
As you may have found it a hard to imagine the place over-run with tourists during your visit, from our visit in June '06 we can hardly imagine it with no people as there were THRONGS there when we spent Brent's 26th birthday there :-)