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This was a rough day. The headwinds continued nonstop all day long, and our bodies were exhausted and our spirits low by the time we made it to Minerve. We've decided to stick it out one more day to Carcassonne, and then reroute ourselves out of this hellish wind tunnel.
We were able to lift our heads a bit to catch some sights along the way. The town of Capestang snuck up on is - from afar it looked like a sprawling, not very interesting place, but we turned the corner and saw this impressive cathedral.
It also has a canal system and riverboat life. This was our first hint that we were entering a riverboat tourist area.
Fracking is not so popular for some French too. With all this wind, you'd think they'd put up a few more turbines! We've only seen about a dozen.
Lunch stop in front of the town hall of unnamed town. Pretty. And pretty windy.
A new addition to my picnic - squeezy sun-dried tomatoes!
Another flyspeck town with an amazing semi-ruined cathedral. Or is it a chateau?
After a couple of brutal hills (actual hills + wind), we entered a completely uninhabited stretch with rock formations and natural arches. This whole area is known for natural arches - carved out of the rock by the unrelenting wind!
Pretty dam and falls.
One of the challenges of cycling (or driving, I suppose) through an area where you don't know the language is figuring out the road signs. For example, we figured out pretty quickly that "chausee deforme" means "strasse schaden" in French. However, one puzzling sign we kept seeing was "ponte submersible." Then we finally passed one!
Yep, drive your Renault through that and hope the river stays low!
Anyway, along we went, over a series of short, steep punishing hills (Arah walked the last... sigh), with more and more dramatic scenery.
Around the last corner was our destination - Minerve! Wow!
This bridge is the "new" enterence. Before it was built in 1908, the town was inaccessible when the river was high.
The town dates from Roman times, but the current pavement from about 1100. Pre-bicycles.
There's our hotel, the charming and lovely La Barbacane. We couldn't check in for a couple of hours, so we locked up our bags and bikes and wandered around.
The old South gate was steps from our hotel. You can still see where the portcullis went up and down.
This is how you used to get into town (siege-proof)
Walking below the natural fortifications.
Minerve is gorges!
This is the other ancient entrance to the town. There used to be a giant Castle where that post is. The column all that's left.
Medieval streets
More natural arches. The river completely disappears under these at points.
On the far side of the river was an interesting historical recreation of Simon de Montfort's deadly trebuchet (accessible by a definitely-not-attorney-approved pathway). Simon pregnated the supposedly impregnable Minerve with these bad boys in 1240, after which he attempted to burn 140 Cathars at the stake because they refused to convert from their Christianity to Simon's flavor of Christianity (a little confusing, see: Crusades). Anyway, Minerve was never the same after that.
Note: stop here if you don't want to see lots of food pix.
Disheartened by that depressing ode to senseless violence, we decided that we needed a good meal. We took our hosts' recommendation and ate at the stylish place in town, Chansonvent. It was amazing. Multi-course menus only, and a bit fancier than we usually choose, but we loved it!
For A: Warm brioche with goat cheese and salad
Followed by roast pork
And a cheese platter that included this gorgeous and beautiful shaved cheese - we think they called it "Monk's head?" (Maybe that's after Simon got to it...)
For E: Asparage avec volute (he never eats asparagus at home...)
A mysterious veal roulade
Cheese plate
And a spectacular dessert! All washed down with a bottle of delicious local wine.
Sated, we crept back to our inn over the cobblestones, and used this crazy old key to get back in.
The funky decor outside our room.
And slept, trying to heal body and soul for another tough ride tomorrow...
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