The Black Mountains, Cathar ruins, and the Canal du Midi…again

Day 9 France 2012

This part of France was home in the eleventh to the thirteenth centuries to a religious group called the Cathars.  Leon likes to call them the first Protestants, but they were a group who believed that life was a battle between good (spiritual) and bad (material).  They considered material things evil and of the devil.  They focused on the teachings of St. John and believed in only baptism as a sacrament.  They also believed in reincarnation and were vegetarians.  You can imagine that the Pope and the Catholic church were not happy with them  

The King of France wanted to consolidate his power over the southern part of France, and the Pope needed to make a strong statement that the only acceptable Christianity was the Roman Catholic style.  These two men joined forces to wipe out the Cathars, and over the course of a generation, they managed to massacre, torture, and burn at the stake every single Cathar in France.  The castles and towns that were home to the Cathars were destroyed, and as we drove around the towns of Lastours and Minerve, we could see the haunting ruins of their fortresses still standing.  

These photos are from Lastours:

 Minerve, another Cathar town, was not on a mountain top but was sculpted out of a rugged canyon gorge. 

The tall tower on the left is all that remains from the original Cathar city.

 There is a river that has cut huge tunnels through the mountain under the town.

The Black Mountains are to the north of the town where we are staying.  We programmed Helen to take us to one of the Cathar towns, and she decided to take us on some of the most narrow mountain roads we have ever been on.  It was sort of like the Pig Trail, except one lane and much higher mountains.  There were lots of hairpin curves, and these mountains were so high that the tops were covered with evergreen trees.  There was a distinctive tree line.  Sometimes we found an Alpine type meadow covered in beautiful wild flowers.  From the tops of the mountains, we could see the Pyrenees.  As we came over the mountains, we noticed that the southwestern side of the mountains was dry while the northeastern side of the mountains was lush and green with the beautiful River Grave running through.  There were tiny little villages up in the mountains, and we wondered how they managed to live so far from civilization.  We were definitely in the French Boonies!  At one point, Helen said we were on an “unpaved road.”  Yep, we were on a gravel/dirt road.  That was when Leon said that he was going to get out the map and find his own way and to heck with Helen’s shortcut over the mountain.

We stopped at Homps on the way back where the Canal du Midi has a big intersection.  There were dozens of really fancy canal boats lined up on the sides of the canal.  This little town has canal boat tours from here.  There are little sidewalk cafes all along so that you can  get something to eat and drink and sit and watch the boats coming and going up and down the canal.  

Today was a holiday in France…Pentecost.  Everything was closed, even the large grocery stores.  Luckily our cupboard was full, and we had plenty of gas in the car.  Tomorrow we will need to stock up again.

Something we noticed today was that the stop signs here have STOP (in English) on them.  They may have always been like that, but we never realized it until today.