Isobel has a tiny coffee as we wait for the tour
Le Gouffre Géant and Grotte de Limousis, Petanque and a Lightning Storm, Languedoc, France - 12th August 2018
Another of the recommendations of the dude who owns the house is a visit to some nearby caves - the Gouffre Géant at Cabrespine and the Grotte de Limousis. The Gouffre Géant wins on sheer epic scale (it's truly enormous) but we do the smaller of the two, at Limousis, first, and it proves to be the better visit. This is partly because the tour actually takes us through several chambers in the extensive cave system, so you get to feel a bit more like you're actually exploring the underground world, but also because the guide is amusing and talks slowly and clearly enough so that we can both easily translate for the boys, so that they also know what's going on. The tour of the Cabrespine "giant" is much less extensive and the tour guide rattles through her spiel rapidly and with a heavy accent, making it frankly baffling. However, the size of the cave is truly staggering, so it's still worth a look. In between the two, we stop off at Villeneuve de Minervois for a spot of lunch, and afterwards, after Harry spots some actual otters in the river, as we head back to the Cité of Carcassonne to watch the evening light show of the living stones: Les pierres sont vivantes en ma Cité de Carcassonne! Later, it's the night of the Perseid meteor shower maximum, but as usual the weather conspires to render the whole thing moot again. However, at least time there's some compensation by way of a spectacular lightning storm over Carcassonne. Before that, we're eating out again whilst watching a keenly-played game of petanque, and before all of that we spend a second day down at Lac de la Cavayére, for another swim in the warm, fresh water.
next album: The Château Comtal, Lastours and the Journey Home, Carcassonne, Aude, France - 14th August 2018
previous album: Abbaye Sainte-Marie de Lagrasse and The Lac de la Cavayère, Aude, France - 10th August
Fred's up in the rocks
The tour group assembles by a small door to the cave
Harry and Isobel appear
Stalagmites are nicely reflected in water
More rock features
The green pool, which stays at 8°C all year round
The tour guide perches on a fence
Twisty rocks
Delicate crystals in the Aragonite 'chandelier'
More stalagtites
The tour continues through the cave system
The tour guide pretends to hold up the cave
Spectacular columns of concretion on the way out
Hundreds of needle-like stalactites dangle
Fred leaves the cave
The town of Villeneuve de Minervois and some vines
The sleepy town of Villeneuve
We walk around Villeneuve
Another café lunch
There's a fiddle statue like at Cambridge Folk
Tree-covered French street
A closed-up bakers
Looking down from the top of the hill
Villeneuve back street and clock tower
Timber frame buildings
Harry eats a Croque Monsieur
Harry's got ice cream all over his face
Up in the hills outside cave 2: the Gouffre Géant
The gang roam around
Cabrespine 'giant hole' is not quite Gouffre Géant
This cave is 200 metres from top to bottom
Epic stalactite structures
The Jules Rimay world cup is framed
Millions of stalactites
More groovy stonework
Alien-like concretions
Regimented trees
We have lunch back at the house
Harry tries to hack up a cork
Harry's got some pants on outside his trousers
Fred does his astro jacks out in the street
Harry spots actual otters in the river
Isobel, Harry and Fred wander back up to the Cité
A shuttered-up hairdressers
The sun sets over Carcassonne
The boys run around again
The crowd gathers for a Son et Lumiere show
There are some impressive projections going on
A map of France in lights
Some kind of dance occurs within the Château Comtal
More dancing in the Château
A dancer stands on his head
Harry looks a bit glum
We're in a café by the lake
A long and dusty track
Fred's looking for grasshoppers again
Some dude plays guitar to himself
Harry joins in with grasshopper chasing
Some boys hurl themselves off the pedalo pier
A water hydrant is leaking
Boules in the Bastide of Carcassonne
Thumbs up during a game of Petanque
The game of boules is on
The next shot is considered
The cochinelle is retrieved
It's time for tea
Isobel and the boys
The boys look for lizards in the drainpipes
Old posters on the door
An old, broken, Pepsi noticeboard
More posters, including Tintin
The boys are a blur as they run around in the rain
The boys in the rain
It's lashing it
We retreat inside the Brasserie des Platanes
The Brasserie des Platanes in the rain
Harry's still in the rain
A sign from Billingsgate fish market
Harry's got wet hair
A wet street
Lightning fills the sky and brings day to night
Some in-cloud lightning over Carcassonne
There's a low-down flash of lightning
Filligree traces of a horse's head in the clouds
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Isobel has a tiny coffee as we wait for the tour
Isobel has a tiny coffee as we wait for the tour
Fred's up in the rocks
The tour group assembles by a small door to the cave
Harry and Isobel appear
Stalagmites are nicely reflected in water
More rock features
The green pool, which stays at 8°C all year round
The tour guide perches on a fence
Twisty rocks
Delicate crystals in the Aragonite 'chandelier'
More stalagtites
The tour continues through the cave system
The tour guide pretends to hold up the cave
Spectacular columns of concretion on the way out
Hundreds of needle-like stalactites dangle
Fred leaves the cave
The town of Villeneuve de Minervois and some vines
The sleepy town of Villeneuve
We walk around Villeneuve
Another café lunch
There's a fiddle statue like at Cambridge Folk
Tree-covered French street
A closed-up bakers
Looking down from the top of the hill
Villeneuve back street and clock tower
Timber frame buildings
Harry eats a Croque Monsieur
Harry's got ice cream all over his face
Up in the hills outside cave 2: the Gouffre Géant
The gang roam around
Cabrespine 'giant hole' is not quite Gouffre Géant
This cave is 200 metres from top to bottom
Epic stalactite structures
The Jules Rimay world cup is framed
Millions of stalactites
More groovy stonework
Alien-like concretions
Regimented trees
We have lunch back at the house
Harry tries to hack up a cork
Harry's got some pants on outside his trousers
Fred does his astro jacks out in the street
Harry spots actual otters in the river
Isobel, Harry and Fred wander back up to the Cité
A shuttered-up hairdressers
The sun sets over Carcassonne
The boys run around again
The crowd gathers for a Son et Lumiere show
There are some impressive projections going on
A map of France in lights
Some kind of dance occurs within the Château Comtal
More dancing in the Château
A dancer stands on his head
Harry looks a bit glum
We're in a café by the lake
A long and dusty track
Fred's looking for grasshoppers again
Some dude plays guitar to himself
Harry joins in with grasshopper chasing
Some boys hurl themselves off the pedalo pier
A water hydrant is leaking
Boules in the Bastide of Carcassonne
Thumbs up during a game of Petanque
The game of boules is on
The next shot is considered
The cochinelle is retrieved
It's time for tea
Isobel and the boys
The boys look for lizards in the drainpipes
Old posters on the door
An old, broken, Pepsi noticeboard
More posters, including Tintin
The boys are a blur as they run around in the rain
The boys in the rain
It's lashing it
We retreat inside the Brasserie des Platanes
The Brasserie des Platanes in the rain
Harry's still in the rain
A sign from Billingsgate fish market
Harry's got wet hair
A wet street
Lightning fills the sky and brings day to night
Some in-cloud lightning over Carcassonne
There's a low-down flash of lightning
Filligree traces of a horse's head in the clouds