A trip to Montsegur

Chateau Montsegur is one of the Cathar Castles in this part of the Languedoc. The Cathars were a Christian sect who were persecuted by the Catholic Church in the Middle Ages. The Cathars built their castles as a means of defence against the crusades that had been ordered by Pope Innocent and usually resulted in a siege. One such siege took place at Montsegur during 1244 and when the Cathars were eventually starved out of their hiding place, two hundred of them were burned on a pyre at the foot of the castle. Purely for being the wrong kind of Christian. Another part of their defence was the position of the castle and as you will see if you travel around this area, the Cathar Castles always appear to be on totally inaccessible outcrops of rock, which now translates into spectacular locations.
A short drive from our base near Puivert was lengthened slightly by a temporary road closure at Belesta, but within forty minutes we were at the car park, looking up at the chateau and the beautiful blue skies that surrounded it.

The path leads from the car park across the meadow where the Cathars were slaughtered in 1244. This Cathar cross commemorates the event.

A wall butterfly.

Wall butterfly feeding on a Scabious flower.

A Silver Studded Blue.

The walk then passes through a thickly wooded slope, before opening out onto rocky, limestone, dotted with grasses and low growing shrubs. This area was full of butterflies.

The walk up is quite steep, but the views get better and better as you approach the chateau ruins. After about forty minutes walking you will reach the entrance.

The walls are high and very thick, quite obviously built with defence in mind. The courtyard is quite small and it is easy to imagine how cramped it must have been with four hundred people in there under siege conditions.

A walk around the outer walls reveals fabulous and distant views all around.

Looking down into the woods and gorges of the Ariege.

This view looks out towards Mont Soularac and Mon St Barthelmy. The village of Montsegur can just be seen in the bottom left of the picture.

Around to the back of the Chateau ruins another access point has been built.

Leading into a dark chapel area, with bright light entering through the walls high above.

On the way down we were noticing the crickets leaping around, but whilst they stay still, they are increadibly well camouflaged.

This one maybe stood out a bit more. This is a Saddle Backed Bush Cricket. Quite an extraordinary looking creature.

Montazels and the Maison Des Vignes

We moved from the Moulin Blau near Puivert, to the Maison Des Vignes in the small village of Montazels. It is a quiet, sleepy village on a south facing slope, overlooking Couiza and the river Aude. There is nothing really remarkable about Montazels, it is just perfect in it's ordinariness. Typically French and typically southern. It is just ordinary people getting on with their lives. It does however have a very pleasant view, across to Rennes Le Chateau on the opposite ridge and east towards the ruined chateau in the village of Coustaussa and Mont Le Cardou just beyond.

We feel very at home in Montazels, just as we do in the Maison Des Vignes. It is an old, stone built house that sits on a very minor village road, overlooking an orchard and down into the valley beyond. Sitting out on the terrace now, in the warm September sunshine, it is hard to think we are leaving tomorrow. The house has been nicely preserved and restored and feels like the perfect place to us.

When we haven't been out walking, we have spent most of our time out on the terrace watching the world go about it's business. Watching the lizards scuttle back and forth, the crickets doing apparently nothing much at all and the numerous and varied butterflies flitting about the olives and the fruit trees in the orchard. There is a soft and gentle rhythm to life in Montazels, kept gently in check by the regular chimes from the various church clocks around the valley. Time has little meaning, but it's there if you need reminding.
The village is surrounded by orchards, olive groves and vineyards, beautifully kept and fabulously productive. The walking from the house is not too strenuous, but very rewarding. When we have been in the spring, the flowers, particularly the orchids are just wonderful to see. Now in the early autumn there are still wild flowers, but not in profusion as they are earlier in the year. Now there is the harvest, of grapes, figs, peaches, apples, pears..... There is interest in trying to photograph and identify all the different kinds of butterfly and there's the walks, just beautiful in there own right. So much here to see and to learn about, beit natural history, prehistory, or just history. The whole area is steeped in it.

To France and The Languedoc & Le Moulin Blau

Having travelled down to Manchester on the Sunday we were all ready for an easy day with our flight to Carcassonne being at 12:30. And there was nothing difficult about it really, but it was so tedious, with queues for every little move we made. It even started before we got to the airport with a traffic queue that made our supposed 12 minute journey from the hotel to the airport into a one hour crawl. We queued for the bus to take us to the terminal building, we queued to check our bags in, we queued for a cup of coffee. Then we had a break of twenty minutes or so while we waited for the departure board to tell us where to queue next. Ah, gate 49, more queuing, then a queue to get on the aeroplane. In all the hour and a half flight involved three and a half hours stood in a variety of queues, none of them interesting or entertaining.
Touchdown at Salvasa airport and a temperature of thirty degrees, lovely. Into the terminal building and guess what, no one at customs to check passports, so we had to queue while they tried to arrange for someone to check us through. I guess an aeroplane landing at 15:30 in the afternoon caught them out, I mean, they wouldn't be expecting it would they.
Soon we were in our hire car and on the road for Puivert, resolving to drive down in future, it might take us four days but when we did it in the spring, it was far more enjoyable than flying had turned out to be. We had the traditional stop off at Leclerc hyper market near Limoux to stock up on essentials like wine, beer and cheese, plus one or two other bits and pieces to make meals with. We headed up the upper Aude valley to Quillan and turned off into the hills along a steep and winding road onto a plateau surrounded by mountains. At the far end of the plateau lies Puivert and  the Moulin Blau, where we are staying, is just outside the village of Puivert.
The drive drops down off the road to Chalabre to the converted mill beside the babbling river Blau. Not a large river at all, we would call it a beck at home, but a beautiful and peaceful setting.

 Moulin Blau, a lovely holiday location in a delightful setting. The owners have only been there since January, but have already transformed the place into a very comfortable gite, with exceptional outdoor space. Ken & Imke, who own the place, live onsite and are very friendly, but discreet too. There presence was never intrusive and at times turned out to be extremely helpful.
If you fancy staying at Moulin Blau, take a look at their website on www.lemoulin lau.com or you can email them on lemoulinblau@hotmail.com

La Lune

After a balmy, relaxing evening, taking in the natural beauty of our surrounding and the odd glass of local wine, we retired, to get up ready to make the most of our first full day. The sky was clear blue, not a cloud to be seen, so we headed of to Lac Montbel a few miles downstream from here. Our intention was to circumnavigate the lake, a walk of about ten miles. We wanted to enjoy the hot sunshine, do some photography and just see what nature had to show us as we wandered. The lake was very low, much lower than when we had been there on a previous occasion at the same time of year. Parking by the lake we set of along a well marked path. According to the map, the path followed the shoreline all the way around, so no problem there then. There was lots of interest along the way, various Autumn fruits, including a wild pear tree with some rather hard, but non the less tasty pears. There was a few wild flowers including a field with two large patches of Autumn crocus.

 There was also numerous, brightly coloured butterflies to photograph, when they stayed still for long enough.

 After we had been walking for an hour and a half we came across a small beach bar where we bought some more water. It had become a concern that we might have underestimated how much we would need, so we were very pleased to be able to stock up. We continued out onto what eventually appeared to be a peninsula and as we turned the corner at the farthest point we began to feel a bit confused about where we were. I resorted to looking at the map and for a while that just added to the confusion. I could see the Club Nautique on the far shore of the lake, so that helped me to determine where we were. It still didn't look right though. It seemed like whichever direction we went, we were surrounded by water. It became so disorientating we weren't even sure anymore about how we had got there. It almost felt like we were on an island.

I looked at the map again and between the Club Nautique and where I thought we were there was an island in the lake, but I could see no sign of it. Then I had a moment of realisation. We were on the island! With the water level being so low, the island had become attached to the shore and temporarily turned into a peninsula. By following the shoreline we had mistakenly left the path behind and wandered out onto the island. We decided to retrace our steps and then go back the way we had come. We were about half way round the lake, but our island excursion had been quite a large detour. We felt more certain of our route if we headed back the same way. It seems unbelievable that you could get lost walking around a lake, but we did and for a few minutes it was quite disconcerting.
We watched herons and egrets stalking the fish in the shallows and wagtails scuttling along the shoreline. We saw an osprey take a fish from one of the reserve lagoons just back from the main lake. It was unable to hang onto it though, the fish was too large and the osprey struggled to fly with it in it's talons! Eventually giving way and dropping the fish from a great height. Before long we were back to the car and heading back through Chalabre and home to the Moulin Blau.

The Changing Season

It's only early September, but there is a distinct autumnal feel to the natural world. The fellside has quickly turned a russet brown as the green bracken dies back for the winter. There is a great bounty in the hedgerows this year with lots of berries and nuts on all the trees and shrubs. This morning we were feeling distracted by our impending trip back to The Languedoc and couldn't really motivate ourselves beyond a walk around Yewdale, around an hours walk.

We walked up to the fell gate near Hollywath and followed the fell wall past Far End and through to Yewdale Woods. I still refer to it as the fell gate, even though strictly speaking it has moved a 100 yards up the track and been converted into a cattle grid, or a porte Canadien as the French call them.

After heavy rain last night the becks were quite full once again. It feels like we are heading towards the autumn stormy season with an already high water table....

Growing in the shelter of Low Yewdale Bridge, this Welsh Poppy doesn't seem to know that the summer is fast disappearing.

Yewdale Beck, Yewdale Woods and Yewdale Crags. This is Yewdale!

Blackberries a plenty, though in truth, there would be a lot more in this condition with a little more sunshine.

Hazel nuts. As one season comes to an end another makes a start. Notice that towards the bottom left of the photo, there are new catkins appearing ready for next spring.

Sloes on a Blackthorn branch. Interesting to note that the Blackthorns that had been cut by the hedge cutters earlier in the year had no fruit on them at all, but the branches that were out of reach of the henchmen looked like this. The fruit must grow on new growth, but if the new growth gets cut back there is no fruit. We had to search deeper into the hedge to these beauties. They might look a bit like grapes, but the taste is nothing like!

Rydal, Cave or Quarry?

I can never say the word Rydal without recalling an American tourist who was staying at the same guest house as us, in York. She asked where we were from and when we told her 'The Lake District' she told us that she had been staying in RYdaaal, with heavy emphasis on the Y and a long and lingering A. That was in 1984 and her pronunciation has stuck in my mind all those years.
On Wednesday we headed to RYdaaal for some photography around the lakes of Rydal Water and Grasmere. Over the years we have walked around these two lakes many, many times. It was one of our 'go to' walks when the weather kept us off the higher fells and became known to us as 'Poet's Walk', mainly because the section between Grasmere and Rydal was often walked by Wordsworth, Coleridge and Southey, as well as many of their poetic visitors. In the time since we first 'wandered lonely' along these byways they have become much busier. So much so that we now avoid it at peak visitor times and have been waiting for the main holiday season to end before going anywhere near. Parking at Pelter Bridge we took the lane towards Rydal Water, taking a few shots of the lake on our approach, the light was disappointing, but would come and all morning. We took the track up towards Rydal quarry and it soon became apparent that the humidity levels were very high, making the carrying of full camera kit, including tripod, extremely uncomfortable. However, I was pleased that I had made the effort to carry my tripod as it was very useful in Rydal cave where I used a thirty second exposure to make the most of the limited natural light in there.

Rydal Cave, which is actually a close head quarry. It seems to be widely referred to as Rydal Cave, but I think of a cave as a naturally occurring thing and this was quarried. The water isn't very deep and is teeming with very healthy looking minnows. Large slabs have been placed in the water to give access to the back of the 'cave'.

As I went into the 'cave' I could see the walls and roof and wondered why it had been quarried as it didn't look like usable stone. But as you can see in this picture, at the back of the cave is the slate that the quarrymen sought. I believe Mr Fessett, who owned the quarry on Kirkstone and Kirkstone Galleries at Skelwith Bridge, wanted to re-open the quarry, but was not given planning permission.

The soothing green and calm of Rydal Water.

Hot and humid, sunny and cloudy. The light came and went very quickly as the clouds moved around.

Looking towards Grasmere, some of the clouds looked quite threatening.

Whilst back towards Ambleside, the sun was shining.

Some walks you can never tire of...

I think we probably walk from home, up to Tarn Hows at least once a week. We never get tired of it, there are several routes, the walk is different every time and the views are just so beautiful. How could anyone tire of this. No, we just feel lucky to be able to enjoy this experience whenever we want too.
This time we decided to take the path from the village that runs alongside the road to Hawkshead, down past the lake and into Monk Coniston Woods at a place called Boon Crag. The woods here are part of the Monk Coniston estate and have been managed by The National Trust since Beatrix Potter left them to The Trust as part of her bequest. Monk Coniston was previously owned by a Lancashire mill owner, James Marshall. He collected trees from all around the world and so many of the trees here are not strictly native, but the mature woodlands are a wonderful and interesting place to be. Without straying from the path I recently identified some 17 different species and there were a few others that I couldn't identify, including quite a few coniferous trees that I find tricky to tell, one from another.

This tree caught my attention as we walked through the wood. For some reason it's bark seems to spiral around the trunk. I think it is a young redwood.

In the sunny glades within the wood there were lots of Speckled Wood butterflies.

And this cherry tree, playing host to a fern, looking very comfortable with it's marsupial like home.

At High Cross the path leaves the wood and the view back to Coniston Old Man opens out.

There is a small tarn near the crossroads at High Cross, it is known as Wharton Tarn.

Turning left, the path then follows a ridge, sometimes through woodlands and sometimes through more open areas like here, looking through a gap n the wall towards Fairfield.

After a mile and a half the path reaches Tarn Hows.

Always fabulous views in all directions.

Deer can do a lot of damage to the trees by feeding on the bark. This small area above Tarn Hows has several trees recently stripped of their bark by deer. It's unlikely that these Rowan trees will survive.

We walked around the tarn and then took the footpath from the main car park, back down through the Monk Coniston Woods, returning to Boon Crag, the lake and eventually the village. A walk of around three hours, allowing time for photography. The above picture is the summer house at Monk Coniston Hall.