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23rd September 2016 Kayaking - Surf Skiing: St. Sulpice to Cabrerets Wind Direction: Wind Stength: Surf / Sea State: Air Temperature: Sea Temperature: Weather: Sunny and hot :) Max Speed: Distance Covered: 19 km (Nautical Miles - unless stated otherwise) Friday 23rd September – canoe ***** sunny & hot – St. Sulpice to Cabrerets – 19km & out 5 hours Another beautiful quiet morning on the river bank with kingfishers, grey wagtails and even a dipper :) We did our exercises – waiting until the sun had got round to us before starting this morning! Had breakfast and packed the van up before driving 2 miles down the road to the canoe hire place we had seen on our bike ride yesterday. Mag was initially not too keen but we paid our 40 euros for the longest distance – 19km along the Cele river from St. Sulpice back to the hire place near Cabrerets. We quickly got ready and the lady, together with her little dog, took us up to the drop off point in St. Sulpice in the mini bus with the canoe on the trailer at the back. On the way she pointed out the various stages to look out for including two canoe slides down weirs! Mag decided she would definitely get out and walk for those!! She helped to get the canoe in the water and then we were off – it was all very quick. The river wasn’t as fast flowing as I expected and the whole 19km was quite a hard paddle. The upper stages were quite deep probably because of the weirs and the slightly faster flow didn’t start until the last section. We saw some brilliant wildlife, including several herons, one of which was waiting for us as we past under St. Sulpice bridge right at the beginning. A lot of kingfishers and grey wagtails, a dipper, various ducks and some little grebes, lots of Jays squawking in the trees and a brilliant display by a buzzard soaring above the trees and around the fantastic cliffs which line the whole river. No sooner had we set out than we reached what we understand is a very famous diving spot. Apparently it is the only water filled accessible cave of its type and divers flock here to do the dive from all over the world. We saw several German divers getting ready as we passed the spot with two already kitted out and in the water. It must be a massive cave because they were taking lots of equipment with them including extra tanks and motorised propellers! Very James Bond!! We watched them for a while but didn’t see where they actually went down. The first marker on the journey is the small town of Marcilhac sur cele, where we stopped for lunch the other day. This was also the first canoe slide. Mag got out and walked at this point and I went down by myself, getting thoroughly wet and the canoe full of water!! I then had to try and get the water out and the canoe back against the flow to get her back in again, but it went surprisingly easily. Back to paddling until we found a nice beach of shingle in a shallow bit where we could get the canoe ashore and eat our lunch. The next section took some time and was quite hard on the arms but we eventually came to the mill with the next slide and Mag decided it would be easier to stay in so we aimed for the narrow mouth and whizzed down! We loved it so much we went back against the flow, walked up the side and did it again. The lady said it was fun to do that because it ‘was not just for the kids’!! Great fun and a shame there were not more to come. That one wasn’t half so hectic and we didn’t get any water in the canoe that time. On downstream under a couple of bridges including the one we biked over near the end of our bike ride yesterday at Sauliac sur cele. This is the village we are staying in but it still took a surprising amount of time to get from the bridge to the spot where you can see the chateau opposite our small beach. We past a couple fishing in our spot and headed for what we thought would be a shallow spot where we would have to get out and pull the canoe over but it was actually the fastest and closest to a rapid we had seen all day :) There were a couple of shallow patches where we had to get out and tow but this last bit was kinder on the arms and we were able to just go with the flow and watch the trout swimming around us – some were pretty big! We thought we would never see the sign for the arrival at the hire place as we had been going for over 4 hours but finally we could see it in the distance and our numb bums were pleased to be able to move and walk the canoe up the bank. We gave our life jackets, oars and the barrel to keep all our stuff dry back to the lady and thanked her for a lovely day. We got back in the van and got dry then headed back the 2 miles to our spot on the river – our third night!! We are here by ourselves tonight. The young lads from last night packed up their tent and left quite early this morning. A tin of chunky chicken with peas and carrots was all we could face preparing tonight! Exhausted but happy after a great day – it was hot and sunny again too :) Saturday 24th September – Relax, sightsee and travel – visit 29000 year old cave paintings at Grottes Pech Merle – sunny and hot Another treat this morning, had breakfast watching a red squirrel in the nut tree on the opposite bank turning the leaves back to see if there were any nuts then running back over the branches to hide them :) Kingfisher and Dipper again too but not so many times as before. There were also literally hundreds of martins flying above the cliffs. We packed up and actually left our lovely spot by the river after 3 nights!! We didn’t get very far before we were distracted by the Grottes Pech Merle which two couples we have bumped into over the last couple of days said were a must see. They are just outside the next village down – Cabrerets. The drive up there through steep forest lined cliffs was beautiful. We parked and went to the office and were told there was a guided tour in half an hour and that there was a film playing with English sub titles which would explain about the famous cave paintings. We paid our 11 euros each, watched the film then went down to the entrance for the tour to start at 12.15. This is a walking tour and although they do have English ones this one was with a French speaking only lady and we were given a booklet explaining in English. The caves have the usual stalagmites and stalactites but are most famous for the original cave man drawings on the walls and ceiling of the caves. A group of teenagers found the caves in the 1920s and we saw the hole through which they made their initial discovery! The paintings are amazing and very hard to describe. They date back 29000 years and are of horses, mamouths, ibex, cattle and women mainly. They even used colours and the lines were drawn with fingers, they also blew the paint round their hands to leave imprints and spat the colour onto the walls too. Some of the drawings used the natural rock to form the shape such as the famous horses heads. When you think that the people only had primitive light it is unbelievable that they got into these caves which were habited by bears and these paintings ever emerged let alone survived. Another fascinating thing were the footprints of a teenager and a small child which have been preserved in the same process which makes the stalagmites. There was absolutely no photography but of course I couldn’t do that so I did sneak a few shots. Quite a long way into the tour somebody took a photo with a mobile phone of a drawing on the underneath of a ledge and the woman was really cross. When we got to the famous horses she clicked the light off very quickly when she had finished speaking knowing that the people at the back were taking the photos!! When we emerged from the cave an American woman took a photo of one of the postcards and that sent the woman into overdrive, she was absolutely fuming and had a good old moan to the lady on reception ‘photo, photo, photo!!!!’ We bought a couple of postcards which show the paintings off well and set off on our way again. We travelled over the river Lot and up to St. Cirq La Popie but we were not stopping today. On over the Causses du Quercy eventually coming to a small town called Puylarogue which signposted a point du view which we followed to eat our lunch. The view was mainly of the surrounding fields and the plateau. The best thing was a small grey cat with a pink collar which was up for a game with a piece of long grass :) We needed a shop and found an Intermarche in Monteils to stock up. Then the continuing saga of our quest for Dolmans reached ridiculous proportions when we followed the signpost in Septfonds, lost the trail and found it again, finally parking in the small car park. The arrow pointed to the right of the car park and off we went across scrub land, woods and finally a disintegrating path through brambles before we gave up and returned to the car park to find the Dolman about 20’ away from the van in the trees!!!!! What a couple of wallies! Photo taken so back in the van. It is very hot again today so we could have done without that trek really! Not far now to our destination of the Gorges de l’Aveyron. We came to the medieval town of St. Antonin Noble Val which is on the banks of the Aveyron and were surprised to find a really nice place to park up, not on the camper aire but in a field with a few others a bit further up the river bank road. This is the first time we have parked with others but it is a very nice spot and we are overlooking the river and the willow trees. We had a cuppa and decided to walk up to the town while it was still sunny. It is a bit hot but it was cooler outside the van! We followed the river first of all up to the bridge and were amazed at the size and quantity of Chubb!! They were huge, definitely the biggest fish we have seen this holiday. We then wandered around the old narrow streets and it is a very nice old place. Beautiful square and old buildings in the middle. An English couple who live in their camper van travelling in Spain and France with their 11 year old daughter (!) told us that there is a huge market here on a Sunday so will probably have a look at that and visit the tourist information tomorrow. The man was very chatty and was here about half an hour! We walked back after our rotisserie chicken tea to have a look at the town with what we thought would be a bustling Saturday night restaurant crowd but it was actually very quiet up there. Came back and had to catch up on lots of computer as we have had a busy couple of days and haven’t kept on top of it!! Photo Gallery here |
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