Hidden Treasures of the Ariège Department, Episode 488

Episode Transcript
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Annie Sargent (00:16):
This is Join Us in France, episode 488,
quatre cent quatre-vingt-huit.
Bonjour, I'm Annie Sargent, and Join Usin France is the podcast where we take
a conversational journey through thebeauty, culture, and flavors of France.
Today, I bring you a conversationwith Elyse Rivin of Toulouse Guided
Walks about the Ariège Department.

(00:37):
The Ariège is a lesser-knowntreasure trove of natural beauty,
wonderful sites to visit and verygood culinary offerings as well.
It's all the way south in France and itgoes all the way to the Spanish border.
I think it's a haven for adventurers,families, and anyone looking to
escape the hustle and bustle ofthe more crowded tourist spots.

(01:01):
Much of Ariège is not that touristy,but we've talked about it in several
episodes, I list them in the shownotes, you know, and why do we
keep talking about this place?
Well, because Elyse and I live nearby,we've gone many times and we wanted
to do an episode where we do anoverview of the entire department for
people who are considering a visit.

(01:23):
This podcast is supported by donors andlisteners who buy my tours and services,
including my Itinerary Consult Service,my GPS self-guided tours of Paris on
the VoiceMap app, including my brandnew food tour of Paris, which I'm very
excited about, or take a day trip with mearound the Southwest in my electric car.

(01:45):
You can browse all of that at myboutique joinusinfrance.com/boutique.
Patreon supporters starting at $2a month get new episodes as soon
as they are ready and ads free.
For the magazine part of thepodcast, after the interview
today, I'll discuss the 'Night atthe Museum' or 'Nuit au Musée'.

(02:06):
It's coming up in Paris in May.
Bonjour Elyse.

Elyse Rivin (02:19):
Bonjour Annie.

We have a fun conversation today, we're talking about the Ariège
department in our part of France.
It's beautiful, scenic,but not very touristy.
Touristy for outdoors things, mostly.
Right.
So this is a haven for francophileswho are also people who love an active

(02:43):
vacation, such as bike rides, hikes,nature discoveries, fantastic with people
that have kids, it's a part of Francethat normally doesn't get super hot,
but it could certain days of the year.
You never know.
And of course it's an area we know well,because it's very close to Toulouse.

(03:05):
And so we've been there many times,but we wanted to give you the
rundown of all the great thingsto do in the Ariège Department.

It's a department that is, it actually starts as Annie has
just mentioned, very close to Toulouse.
It actually starts about 20 kilometersaway from Toulouse, technically,
and it goes into the highestpart of the Pyrenees Mountains.
And it is fronted or bordered, ifyou wish, by Spain and the tiny
little kingdom of Andora which is ananomaly, we can say, on the South side.

(03:40):
It's fairly big.
It turns out that 40 percent of itis considered to be a regional park,
which in France means that it's gota certain amount of preservation,
but unlike big parks in the UnitedStates, for instance, it includes towns
and villages and things like that.
That doesn't mean that it's a park wherethere's nothing in terms of commerce

(04:02):
or building or anything like that.
It's just...

Right, because in the US I learned when we were visiting the
Appalachia that the, I think it's calledthe Big Smoky Mountains, there's a park in
there where they actually removed all thepeople that were there to create the park.
And in France, they never do that.

(04:24):
Right.
They just, they kind of put strongrestrictions on development,
but they let the people whoare there live there, you know.

Exactly.
So it's a department that is veryvaried in its geography because the
part that's the furthest north, closestto Toulouse, is relatively flat.
It's not completely flat.
It's like little rolling hills andnice, very soft little valleys.
And then you get into the part that's thefoothills, and that's where there's some

(04:54):
very interesting things to do and see,and then you get into the high mountains.
And it covers a vast territory because itreally on the eastern side, the department
to the east of it is the Aude, and you'realready in a more arid kind of climate.
And then on the west, it goes into thehighest and wettest part of the Pyrenees,
which really top over 3000 meters.

(05:15):
So it's big, it's not that developed,it is a department that historically had
a massive emigration, at the beginning,in the middle of the 20th century, even
before World War II, it was very poor.
It was very rural, whichof course it still is.
And so there were masses, andmasses of people who left.
This is typical of most places,I guess, in the world anyway.

(05:36):
And a lot of them went to thecities, and then a lot of them
went to the United States.
That's ironic, but if you go to New YorkCity, for instance, a whole lot of the
French restaurants there are Ariègeois.
I don't think they went there beingchef de cuisine to begin with, but a
lot of the establishments that havecome down through several generations
are actually owned by families thatleft the Ariège to go elsewhere.

Well, and it is true that if I had been born in the Ariège I might
not have thought this was an excellentplace to stay for the rest of my life.
Yeah, I mean, it's underdeveloped,it is very rural, there's some
fantastic attractions, but nobig industry, no, you know...

One of the few industries that did develop, and actually existed
I think, for a couple of hundredyears was the textile industry.
But unfortunately after World WarII, a lot of the bigger companies
took over a lot of the manufacturing.
And so there's a town, we'll mention itwhen we talk about some of the museums and
things, but there is a small town calledLavelanet, which is where the center

(06:45):
of all this textile manufacturing was.
And now there's one company left, andthere's a museum, but it is true that
with the changing in the demographicsand the people needing to go where
there were lots of jobs, a lot ofthese little towns and villages
wound up being pretty much abandoned.
And it's only when tourism reallybecame important and agricultural green

(07:08):
tourism really brought people back.
Years and years ago I met someone whowas with a group of people, this is
my first traveling through France,this is my hippie days, everybody.
I met a group of peoplewho had bought a village.

Wow.

In the Ariège.
At the time, and I'm talking a long timeago, but this is like maybe 35 years ago,
apparently there were these abandonedvillages that the local government, I
guess, was selling for a pittance forpeople to come and move back in and
work on fixing up the houses as evencountry homes so that there would be life
brought back into some of these valleys.

(07:44):
I don't you can do it anymore.

Well, perhaps someone who wants to start a commune or some sort of
crazy cult, you could do it in the Ariège.

Oh, you can, you can, they're actually, don't, she's laughing,
but unfortunately the bad side of allthis, this is talking about, this is
not about tourism, so don't be worriedbecause it's gone and over with.
But about 15 years ago, there was avillage that's actually not far from
some of the places we're going to talkabout, that not only was just taken
over by a bunch of crazy hippies,but became a cult, you know, it was

(08:15):
like it was run by some crazy guy.
No, it was about Massat.

Massat.

Oh, the Bugarach is something else.
Yeah.
That, yeah, it's in the Aude, right?

So Massat...

M A S S A T.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And I don't know how they got ridof everybody, but it was one of
those places where it was like outof one of those horrible Stephen
King books or something like that.
They're not there anymore.
Everybody don't worry about it.

Listen, I'm in the middle of listening to The Stand again.
What a book!

Is that Stephen King?
Yes.
Oh, he scares me.
I don't read him.

Most of it is not that scary.
It's just, it creates reallyweird situations, yeah.

Anyway, the Ariège is really homey.
I guess I, since I have friends who havesummer homes that they go to regularly,
because it's so, it's really withinan hour's drive to get to a lot of
the pre-Pyrenees, lots of people havenice little places that they've either
worked on or, you know, that kind ofthing, that go there even for weekends

(09:12):
because it's really not that far away.
So it's an area that is kindof user friendly, I would say.
It's not spectacular in the,unless you're into really high
mountains and going hiking in the,you know, up above 2500 meters.
And some people do.
I mean, it's just beautiful, you know?
But otherwise it's just, it's nice, I likeit there, it's green most of the time.

(09:34):
And it's got lots of interestinglittle things to discover.

Right, right.
So we'll talk about, I mean, maybeI should mention this right away, I
looked in Komoot, which is the placeto go if you want to look for hikes
and bike rides in France, but I'm surein many other countries as well, and
they list something like, I think itwas 93 easy loop hikes in the Ariège.

(10:01):
And there was something like 290something intermediate and perhaps 70
or something that were expert hikes.
So when they say expert, I thinkthey mean that you need to bring
equipment and things like that.
Lots and lots of hiking, lotsand lots of mountain biking, and
you can really find a gîte in theAriège for not very much money.

(10:27):
Okay?
It's an ideal place for people to go whoenjoy just hikes and bike rides and having
a good meal at the end of a long hike.
And nature walks, you know, we'll talka little bit about some of the places.
It is a great, great, great area togo if you are doing a vacation with
children and you want to have outdoorthings to do, take them to places
where they have what the French liketo call animation for children, for,

(10:51):
you know, showing how things aredone, getting them to participate.
It's that kind of a place.
And the other thing is,French trails are well-marked.
Right.

It's really comforting to know that even the easy ones
generally are very, very well indicated.
So, you can start out on a trail,they will show you usually a sign
which shows you the route that you'regoing to take, how long it might
take, the distance and everything.
And it's something that I thinkis very good in France, the trails

(11:20):
and the way they're taken care of.

Right, and in the weeks when kids, French kids
are on vacation, then they doanimation, like you were mentioning.
So they're going to have stufflike, we have someone to show them
how to do, you know, pottery likethey used to, or do jewelry like
they used to, or things like that.
It's not really hands on becauseyou, but you watch someone doing it.

(11:43):
And I think it's very fun for kids.
You can find stuff like that year round,but it has to be during school vacations.

In the summer they have.

In the summer, yes, but that's school vacation, right?

Right, that's true, yeah, that's true.
You're right.
But let's start with the stuffthat probably most people are
used to visiting, which of coursewould be castles and villages.
France certainly hasthousands, everywhere.
And even though this is not the,there are not that many in the Ariège
that are so super spectacular, thereare a few that are really great.

Right, so it's not the Loire Valley.

It's not the Loire Valley, and it's not the Lot either
in that sense, but it's got itsown claims to fame, we can say.

Sure..

As far as towns go, Ariège, the biggest city is 20,000 people.
Okay?
So put things in perspective.
That is the City of Pamiers, which quitehonestly is not particularly interesting
from a touristic point of view.

Right.
No, I was there, I looked arounda little bit, not that long ago.
Like all French towns, it has afew streets in the city center that
are okay, but the rest of it...
ehh.
And they have one very famous composer,Gabriel Fauré, who was born there, his
house is there, and they've talked foreverabout doing a museum to Gabriel Fauré.

(13:02):
And it doesn't seem to be gainingspeed, which is unfortunate because
he is, in my opinion, one of thevery best composers out there.
Just love everything he's ever done.

Pamiers, it turns out, it's interesting because it's
not the county seat of the Ariège,but it's the economic center.
It's where there's the most business,where there's a certain amount of high
tech business that's set up there, andthey have these huge shopping centers.
So, if you can imagine a huge,huge, huge county, where the

(13:33):
biggest town is 20,000 gives youan idea of how rural it is, right?
And Foix, which is what we'll talkabout because it has some super
things to see and do there, isfurther into the foothills of the
Pyrenees, and that is the Prefecture.
So how did they work that out?
I don't know, but they didn't give itto the biggest town, they gave it to
the one that's the most spectacular.

(13:55):
I have no idea why.
They fought over it.
Who knows?
They tossed a coin.
I have no idea, you know?
But Foix is the ancient capitalof what was Counts, you know,
whole area in the Middle Ages.
So it has a huge, huge, huge amountof history, medieval history going
up through into modern times.
And it's famous for its castle.

Right.

Which we went to last year with our bootcamp group.
It's fabulously spectacular whenyou come in driving a bus car.
It doesn't make any difference,actually, I think, even by train
because it's sitting up on the top ofthis rock, and you have a background
of the landscape of the Pyrenees andit is really, of course it's been
restored and it's visitable right now.

(14:36):
It's part of it is closed for makingit accessible to handicapped, but it's
been very, very well restored and itis a perfect example of what was in the
middle ages, a real fortified castle,with all of the accoutrements of a
fortified castle to defend itself,you know, for fighting with everybody.

Right, so the only reason why we're not going back to Foix
with the bootcamp in 2024 is becausethey, like you mentioned, they closed
it to make it wheelchair accessible.
And I think it's closed until July?

I think it's closed till the beginning of July.

Right.
But otherwise we would have gone back.
And I just drove through there twicethis week because I had to go back
and forth to Spain and I alwaysdrive through Foix, well, not always,
but usually I drive through Foix.
And you can see the castle, butyou know, blink and you'll miss it.
Like, from the road, you needto be looking out for it.

(15:32):
It's like, from the freeway,the Cité de Carcassonne.
You can see it briefly, butotherwise it's hidden by trees.
But at any rate, it'sa lovely, lovely place.
And it's also a fact that that side of themountain, when you get to Foix is right
when it's going to start going up, andup, and up, and up across the Pyrenees.
And then you're going to hit the twotunnels that take you through to Spain,

(15:57):
which are the Tunnel du Puymorens andthe Tunnel del Cadi on the Spanish side.
Anyway, it's a beautiful mountainousplace, and if you want to enjoy the
mountains rather than try and go, youknow, fast, then don't use the tunnels.

And that is the area where you start to really see the
different levels of mountains.
And that's where a lot of theinteresting things are, the
valleys that go criss-crossingacross East West in that part.
The other castle, of course, whichis, I mean, it's a castle, but let's
face it, it's really just a pileof rubble, but it's so famous that
it's worth climbing up to the top,and that of course is Montségur.

Right.
Montségur is a great hike.
I wouldn't say it's an advanced hike,but you need to have good knees.
It's up, and up, and up, andup for a good 20, 30 minutes.
So don't do that if youhave terrible knees.
I did it several times when I was younger.
Now I'm not sure if I would do thatagain, but it's the sort of place where
you pay a few euros to enter the sitetowards the bottom and then you hike up.

(17:01):
And there are some tours that youcan do there, but not year round.
You know, if you happen to be there whenthere's a tour on, it's worth doing.

Yes.
It's definitely worth doing.
I know vaguely the guy who lives there,actually in the tiny village, there's
a village of Montségur, which is justdown below, which is actually charming.
It's teeny weenie.
It's very pretty.
It has a tiny museum with the historyof the whole siege of Montségur,
because Montségur is famous becauseit was the last stand of the Cathars.

(17:34):
And we've of course talked aboutthe Cathars in several podcasts, but
this is the place that was the finalbattleground where they stood off
against the armies, and there's awhole dramatic history attached to it.
So you need to know that when you goup to the top, you're really, you have
to use your imagination to see what thecastle might've looked like at the time.

(17:55):
But, it is a fabulous sight, andthere were days when it's shrouded
in clouds, you never know ahead oftime, unfortunately, this is that
part of the Pyrenees, but if it'sa nice day, it's really worth it.
If your kids are not too small, theymight also be able to make it up to the
top, but it's a good hike back and forth.
So anyway, this guy, his nameis Fabien, and he does tours.

In English, as well?

I don't know.

Yeah, I've heard him in French, but I
don't know if he does English.

And it's his thing, you know, he's written a couple of
books about Montségur, I mean, hejust sort of adopted the mountain.

But he's also a fairly good historian, like,
he doesn't bullshit people.
I mean, there's a lot of tour guidesthat they spew mostly bullshit.

There are a whole series of runes of castles that are
theoretically part of the history ofthe Cathars that criss cross East West,
basically from there going towardsthe Mediterranean, but this is the
most famous and the most spectacular.
Really.

Yeah.

Now there's another one on the other side of the valley, if you
have a car, which you probably need todo this anyway, it's called Roquefixade.
And the biggest difference betweenthe Roquefixade and Montségur is
that Roquefixade, you can actuallydrive all the way up to the top.
Right.
It's pretty easy.
It's pretty easy.
And it's on the Southern side, so evenon a kind of gray day, you usually have

(19:09):
a little bit more sun and warmth whenyou go to the side, Roquefixade, and you
can see the top of the crenellation ofMontségur from there, and it's a ruin,
but there's a tiny little hamlet up ontop with a place that has a refuge for
hikers, and you can get a coffee there andeverything, which of course at Montségur
you cannot do, it's purely the ruins.
And it's kind of neat if you do one,if you have the time to just go down

(19:31):
and go up the other side and do theother, it gives you a perspective and
try to imagine what it was like in the900s, 1000s, when these people lived
like this, oh my God, we would neverbe able to do this now, you know,

It would be rough on us.

It would be really rough on us, huh?
Yeah.
Where would we get our internet?
I don't know.
It just wouldn't work.
I don't think it really wouldn't work.
And then of course, there are two or threevillages and towns that are really pretty.
We mentioned Foix, which is interestingbecause it has this very old, very
small city center, really tinywhen you think about it, that's

(20:06):
just down below the castle, littlewindy streets with some restaurants
and shops and things like that.
And the rest of the town has sort ofbuilt up around it in a more modern way.
But one of the prettiest towns, and I saytown because I'm not sure where something
stops being a village and becomes a town.
It's like, it doesn'tmatter, I guess, you know.
And that is Mirepoix, which is furthernorth, in the flatter part of Ariège.

(20:32):
Actually is not that far south fromCarcassonne, if you're going towards
Carcassonne, you can do a detour andsort of veer off to the south and
then come back up towards Carcassonne.
It's two thirds of the way therebetween Carcassonne and Toulouse.

Right, so Mirepoix, in my mind, is more like Aude than
Ariège, but it is in the Ariège.

It's Ariège.
Yeah, and it's famous for itsbeautiful, beautiful colored medieval
houses that have been very well takencare of and very well preserved.
It's a very good example of the medievaltowns that were started actually in
the 1200s because of the war with theCathars, these towns that were called

(21:14):
Bastide, and we've talked about a fewothers, but this one is incredible
because it's kept its original gridsystem, you know, straight rectangular,
criss-crossing streets and it'smaintained, it's well preserved houses on
all of the streets in the old city center.
The market square is hugeand it's very famous.
There's this huge market one day a week.

(21:35):
And then there's this cathedral.
The cathedral, interestinglyenough, is not one of the most
famous ones, but it's got some veryinteresting painting on the inside.
I actually, the last time I wasthere, they were trying to do a little
bit of restoration on a piece of itbecause, you know, they get kind of
moldy on the inside from humidity.
And one of the problems with very oldcathedrals is that if you don't have a

(21:58):
lot of money to fix them up, they startkind of crumbling on you, you know?

Yeah.
They do, Mirepoix does afête médiévale every year.
I think they also do a theaterfestival at some point.
Anyway, it's a lively town withsome fun events if you happen
to be there at the right time.

They even have an apple festival.

There you go.

For people like me who love apples, you know, it's like...
Perfect.
In the fall, I think it's inSeptember, they have an apple festival.

This is a small town, but it's a very lively town and it's
not as wet as the rest of the Ariège.

And it is a center of tourism.
This is a place, there are lotsof people who have secondary
homes in and around this area.
It's a place where it's easy tofind someone who speaks English,
which some people find great.
Lots of people don't.
But it is a good place to go to findout about a place maybe to stay, to
rent a gite, or to rent somethingelse, because it is a hub for this

(22:56):
kind of thing, in the area, yeah.
And just to mention a couple of othersthat are very, very tiny, but are
very pretty, that are very close by.
One of them is this very pretty tinylittle village called Camon, which
is famous for having beautiful rosesin front of every single house.
People go there, there's a rosefestival at some point during the year.

(23:19):
And it also has the remains of, Idon't remember now to be honest, if
it's the bishop who was living there,one of the bishops of the cathedral
in Mirepoix had a second home there.
It's only a few miles away.
But it's actually partly occupied still.
It's a renaissance house.
It's absolutely gorgeous.
And there are a few days a yearwhen it's open to the public.
So it's very pretty.

(23:40):
It's just kind of off to the side.
It's just a couple ofmiles outside of Mirepoix.
And in the other direction, a very specialplace, which hopefully will reopen,
called Vals, which is not even a village.
It's, I think there are five houses there.
It used to be a bigger village, butit's famous because at the beginning of

(24:00):
the 20th century, they discovered thatthere was a troglodyte church there.
Troglodyte meaning, of course, it'sunderground or carved out of the rock.
And in the process of trying to reinforceit, they discovered that there are
frescoes in there that date from the900s or 1000s, so it's very cool.
These are little spots that youcan visit when you're in that

(24:21):
area going in and out of Mirepoix.

And this year we'll go with a boot camp to Mirepoix, and
perhaps Vals if can ever catch themayor who has the key to the church.

Catch the mayor, yeah, grab him by the arm, you
know, it's like either that or Igo and make my own key, you know.
But at this point I thinkwhat they're doing is they're
reinforcing a little piece of rock.
I think that's what theproblem was, so I have to...

Okay.

And then there's Saint-Lizier, which is on the
other side of the huge department,it's a fairly big department.
I don't know what to compare it with,but most of what we've been talking
about so far has been more or lessthe southeast part of the department.
Saint-Lizier is a very impressivelittle village, that's perched up
above the hills, but it's on thesouthwestern part of the department.

Right, so if you go to, if you drive to, what do you
call it, uh, yeah, so Saint-Gironsand Saint-Lizier is right after, and
that would be on your way to Lourdes.
Or Luchon.
Or Luchon, yes.
Yes.

And Saint-Lizier is a little jewel.
It's incredible.
It's this tiny, tiny little villageperched up on top of this big hill.
It's, we're really in thefoothills of the Pyrenees.
Down below is a relatively importanttown called Saint-Girons, which
is really a commercial center.
And Saint Lizier is famous for itscathedral with its paintings on the

(25:43):
inside and for the Bishop's Palace.
And then it has a few, very, very wellpreserved little medieval streets.
All the houses have been fixed up.
It's impeccable.
It's clean.
It's very beautiful.
It's just the most amazing little spot.
And it even has a couple of cafes, if Iremember correctly, where you can actually
sit and get a coffee or have lunch.

(26:04):
And it's really amazing to find.

Right, so I've been in that area a few times because my brother's
country house is not far from there.
Unfortunately, that stretch of roadbetween Saint Gaudens and Lourdes, for
some reason, there's accidents thereall the time, terrible accidents.
So if you drive it, just be careful.
I don't know what it is with localsovertaking in dangerous places or things

(26:26):
like that, but I've seen some reallystartling accidents in that stretch of

road.
What a shame.
The town down below, which is the maintown, which is how you get, have access
to Saint-Lizier, is actually, has aroad that goes from there to Foix.
It cuts across the bottom ofthe foothills of the Pyrenees.
So rather than going south intothe mountains for Lourde and
Louchon, you can actually go fromone side to the other, but if you're

(26:51):
in that area, it's worth going upand stopping and seeing, you know.
And then just one of the town that I justwant to mention, but it's closer again
to Montségur, it's actually somewhere onthe road between Mirepoix and Montségur,
and it's not because the town is pretty,this is the town that was once the
center of all the textile industry.
And it has, and there are very few, andAnnie's going to mention a couple of them,

(27:14):
but it's one of the few places that hasan interesting little museum, and it's
a museum of the history of textiles, andI've been there twice, partly because
I'm interested in that, and it has thiscollection of looms from the Middle Ages,
up through the industrial times and ithas a couple of rooms that they've, you
know, reenacted or set up like what wouldpeasants have looked, their houses look

(27:37):
like where the people had the loom andit shows how they collected the wool as
mostly, of course, wool from the sheep.
And the whole history over severalcenturies of the development of
the textile industry in this area.
So it's kind of interesting.
And I think, but I'm not as certain,that in the summer they have
some days when they have littleactivities where especially kids

(27:58):
can participate and stuff like that.

You didn't didn't name it.
It's Lavelanet.

Lavelanet.
Oh, sorry, I didn't.

Oh, you do this all the time, Elyse.
You talk about a place without naming it.
I'm like, give it the name!

I'm looking at the name of it.
I didn't name it, Lavelanet.
See, Lavelanet.
Yes, I'm sorry.
Lavelanet, which is really on theroad between Mirepoix and Montségur.

Very small place, but with a cute little museum, so why not?

Very cute little museum.
Okay, so that basically takes careof our castles and towns, in a sense.
There are a couple of other placesthat we can talk about, but let's
go to one of the things that's oneof the most important attractions in
the Ariège, and that is, it's caves!

Definitely.
The painted caves or non-painted caves.
There are some both.

Yep, painted or non-painted.
So, the Ariège, of course, because asection of the mountains is limestone,
like in the area around the Lot in theDordogne, has lots, and lots, and lots
of caves, lots of spaces like that.
And one of the most important of thedecorated prehistoric caves, is in the

(29:07):
Ariège, and that is the cave of Niaux.

Yeah, La Grotte de Niaux.

And one of the reasons why this is so special is because
there are very few of these cavesleft where it's the original work.
It's not a reproduction.
It hasn't been fixed up.
And to add to that, this particular caveis only for the hardy because it's over
a kilometer inside on uneven territory.

(29:36):
There is no electricity.
You walk through with aminer's lamp on your head.

It's in your hand.

Oh, I went with it on the head.
You had it on your hand?
I had my head.
And you go, it's relativelyuneven territory, I mean, you
just have to watch your footing.
But what you see along the wayis lots of little marks and
indications of human activity.
And then you get to this very specialplace called the Rotunda, which is
where you have the drawings, thatare so famous, and which of course

(30:05):
are, there is a certain concern thateventually they will start to be covered
with calcite and then eventually itwill stop bringing people inside.

Right, so they limit the number of visitors already.
This is one that you have to bookin advance, you won't get in at
the last minute, and they do one ortwo tours in English each day, it
just depends on the time of year.
And they have a whole website, theAriège has a whole website where you can

(30:34):
reserve all of these things on the samewebsite, which is a clever way to do it.
Because the, you know, not everyone of these venues has what it
takes to maintain a good website.

No and this one, I went back to the website the other day and
it's interesting because they have whatin French would be an avertissement,
it's a warning, it just tells you ifyou are not able to do a certain kind
of walk on your own, you do not go in.
I went in quite a few times when I wasworking with different groups and I
knew one of the guides that there arespecialty guides that work in this cave.

(31:11):
And this is one of those caveswhere they're ultra, ultra serious.
If anybody does anything wrong, theyjust take the whole group and take
them right back out of the cave.

Right, and there are some minor difficulties, like when
you, there are places where you have tobend down and step up at the same time.
Which is not something most of us do,so if you're not super coordinated
or if you have balance problems,it's not something I would recommend.

However, if you are able to do this kind of walking, it's fabulous.
Because it gives you an idea of what itmust have been like for the people, this
is late prehistory, so we're talkingten, twelve thousand years ago, the more
recent part, if you want to call it that.
And the fact that they would go in thisfar into a cave, to do these drawings and

(31:59):
they did it apparently with a ceremonybecause the guide will have you make
sounds because there's perfect acousticsin this enormous underground cathedral,
that's what they like to call it.
So clearly, there was some kind ofceremonial aspect to do all of this.
So it's really wonderful ifyou're able to get into this cave.

Right, and they don't, they didn't live in the cave, they just went in
to paint, we don't know why, but they did.
I think it was their church,I don't know, that's my idea.
Perhaps, perhaps.

Something like that.
Across the valley is somethingthat most people don't know
about, it's the corollary to it,it's called La Vache, the cow.
I've been there!
Yeah.
And it's neat because it's a smallone, and this is one where they found
remnants of the fires that they made,because most of these groups lived
not deep inside a cave when it waswintertime, but they lived at the

(32:46):
openings, you know, they took shelterin some of these other kinds of caves.
And then, of course, they were nomadsbecause they went with where the herds
of animals were, but it's fun becausethey have a small collection of the
objects that were found at the time.
So it, they assume it was the same groupof people that in fact went across the
way to go to their ceremonies, you know?
Right.

Right, so they found a ton of, so they found tiny bones, I'm
pretty sure it was in La Vache thatthey have lots and lots of thickness
of snails, because they ate snails.
I mean, you could catch snails, right?
They're easy food.

Snails and rabbit bones, if I remember correctly.

Rabbit bones, I think so as well.
So it's an interesting place to visitand it's, you need to do a tiny little
walk up the hill to get to the entrance.
It's not open year round, socheck the website and all that,
but it's a fun little visit.

And in conjunction with all of this, and by the
way, if I remember correctly, youcan do this on the same ticket.
You can get a ticket forthe Parc de la Préhistoire

Which I've been to as well.

And this is really wonderful if you have children, because it's not
only have they reproduced inside in away that's to get an idea of the size
and the layout, they have reproducedwhat we could call a miniature version
of the whole cave of Niaux, but ofcourse it's big, you know, anyway,
you walk through these hallways.
But outside they have acres wherethey have all of these activities, you

(34:15):
know, and they show how people livedin the prehistory and how they made
their food and how they prepared theleather for clothing and how they made
fire and all of this kind of stuff.
And it's really fun.

This is where you realize they were hardy.

We are not.
Well.
Maybe if we had to be, wewould be, I don't know.

I suppose.

Necessity, right?
But it's really a lot of fun.
There's even a cafeteria there.
You know, it's a place you canstop and have a quick bite to eat.
It's very, very well done.
And it really goes in conjunctionwith a visit to the caves.
And if you can't for whatever reason,go actually into Niaux, go there,
because it will give you a good idea.

Yeah, it's a fun visit, especially with children.
But I went, I don't remember if I don'tremember if I went with my daughter
when she was, maybe she was 15 orsomething, you know, we still loved it.

It's fun.
And then, on the other side ofthe Ariège, on the southwestern
side, we have Mas d'Azil

Ah, yes.

And, Mas d'Azil is also very well known, but of
course it's a little bit different.
It's, I don't even know exactlyhow the correct word from a
geological point of view, it's anenormous opening in the mountain.

The river dug it through.

The river dug it, right?
So it's this huge, huge, huge opening.
I was just back there two weeks ago.
We were, I was checking it out for us.
It's a site that's visitableand it is a site that the
people in prehistory lived in.
But to be honest, it's interestingto do if you've already seen some of
the decorated caves because basicallythe visit inside just shows you the

(35:54):
different levels of this enormouscavity and where the different groups
may have lived and things like that.
But there's nothing,there's no decorated walls.
There's no painting or designs orof marks or anything on the walls.
And they simply have reproduceda few, they've made some photos
to give you an indication of theobjects that may have been found.

(36:14):
Because this was a place where a lot ofthese different groups actually lived.
And the town of Mas d'Azil, which is verycute, actually, a very nice, charming
little town, which is a mile away, ithas a small museum that is open in the
high season, and that is where they haveput many of the objects that they have
found inside the cave of Mas d'Azil.

Yeah, so you can actually drive through that, and I think that's
one of the problems is they need toget rid of the cars again, because
when you're inside, what's left isa river with a sidewalk and a road.
And I think they should just getrid of the cars and it would be
much more pleasant to just enjoythe river without cars zooming by.

Yeah, well, they can't because it's the access to the town.
Yeah.
But this time when I was there two weeksago, they take you up all the way up
to the top, they show you the differentlevels because apparently at the time that
the people lived there were talking again,10, 12, 15,000 years ago, the access in
was not exactly the same as it is now.
But it was interesting, but it'scertainly nothing like going to

(37:20):
a Niaux or something like that.

Right.
Yeah, it's a secondary, yeah.
If you've seen everything else, perhaps.

Yeah, exactly.
It has a nice little picnic areaalong the river, I mean, it's just,
you know, it's that kind of a stop.
But if you're looking for somethingto get an idea of what we talk about
when we talk about the decoratedcaves, no, you need to go to Niaux.
And then Ariège has other caves.
So I'm just going to mention two.
One is Labouiche, which is not farfrom Tarascon-sur-Ariège, which is the

(37:50):
town you go through to get to Niaux.
And also the Parc de laPréhistoire is right there.
And it has an underground river.
And it turns out that this is the longestunderground river gallery in, so far,
that has been discovered in Europe.
So we mentioned theone up near Rocamadour.

Yeah.
Le Gouffre de Padirac.
This one is similar in that youcan go in and take a boat ride on
the underground river, and it hasthese absolutely gorgeous, you know,
formations and things like that.
And it's pretty cool.
I've done it, it's very cool.
I recommend it.
Yeah.
One of the things about this is thatit's great to decide to stay in this area
for a few days, and then there are lotsand lots of different things you can do.

(38:33):
Yeah, you do one a day.
And then the rest of the timeyou hike or you do nothing.

And you eat, which is great too.
Yeah, we like that.
And then there's one other cave inthis area that I've actually visited
called the Grotte de Bédeilhac.
And this is known for its formations, forits stalagmites, stalagmites, stalagmites.
It's close to Foix, bothof these are pretty much in
the same, just general area.
It doesn't have, it has a few marks leftby, you know, handprints from prehistory,

(39:01):
but basically it's a very beautiful cave.
In the summer, theyhave concerts in there.
It's kind of neat.
It's not the kind of place you have tofeel claustrophobic because there's a
really big, big, big, big open spaceinside, but it's kind of neat to go
to listen to some music that echoesoff of the walls in the summertime.
And I remember, this is quite a numberof years ago, going in there and somebody

(39:23):
was telling me that because the openingis so enormous, that in World War II,
there were a few planes, you know, thisis the beginning of the World War II when
they just had these small little planes.
When the Allies came into thispart of Southern France, they hid
some of these little planes inthere before they used them to take
off and give supplies to people.

(39:44):
I'm not even sure what they did.
But, you know, I mean, little historiesthat are attached to places like this.
Yeah.
And then a place that's one of yourfavorites, Les Forges de Pyrène.

Yes, so I really like that place.
It's kind of a, a park where they tryto, so they had a forge, they have a
massive hammer, that still works, youcan see it in action, and what they do
is they, they block off the water in thestream that runs by the house, and then
they let go of the water all of a sudden.

(40:14):
And it activates this huge hammerthat can shape anything into anything.
And it's, it's a very beautiful place.
It's a place where they explain howpeople used to, all the paysans,
all the agricultural workerswould bring their tools to be
sharpened or fixed to this area.

(40:35):
And they also have workshops forkids where they show you things like
pottery and all different things.
It's fantastic with kids, Ithink, because, and again,
it's not open year round.
It's not open every day.
You know, you have to go to thewebsite and make sure it's open, but

(40:56):
I thought it was a great visit becauseit helps you see what it was like.
And it's the sort of place whereyou do, you go, you spend two
or three hours, you bring yourpicnic and then throughout the...
they give you a schedule.
So at this time they do thisworkshop and then half an hour
later there's another one, etc.
And so you want to stay a littlewhile to enjoy all the workshops.

(41:18):
I thought it was great.
I remember, I've only been thereonce, I think, but my husband
loved it, you know, it was like,it was all this kind of metalwork
and then woodwork and, you know...
It is, it really shows you theinventiveness of humans before we had,
you know, hydraulics and all this stuffthat we use today that makes life a
little bit easier for things like that,you know, it is pretty impressive.

(41:38):
A lovely place to visit, really.
And you don't get to see metalwork up close like that very
much, but there you can see it.
They actually work the giant hammer.

Do you remember if they sell any of the things that they make?
I don't remember.

Probably because they, I remember them explaining about
nowadays, you know, if you're...
If you, how do you say pioche in English?
Anyway, you used to get them fixedand to get them fixed you had to
go to a place to a place like this,but nowadays you just buy a new one,
right, which is kind of unfortunate.
I think the only ones, the onlyforgerons and forgers that still exist

(42:14):
are for making horseshoes, I think.
It's a pickaxe.

Oh, pickaxe.
It's a pickaxe.
Oh, wow.
Okay, talking about houses andthings like that, we're going to...
now, basically everything from now onin is really about nature, and a town
that I actually didn't mention, causeI was going to, I guess include it
in the part that talks about hikingand skiing, there is another town
in the Ariège called Ax-les-Thermes.

(42:40):
Ah, yes.
It's up in the mountainson the way to Andorra.
It's fairly high up.
It's famous for its thermal baths.
That's why it's called the Ax-les-Thermes.
And for being basically the hub of allthe skiing and the serious hiking in
the southeastern part of the Ariège.

And last time I went through there, it was snowing.

Yes, it gets lots of snow.
It's really, we're inserious mountain country.
It's very interesting, it's, I don'tknow, I mean, you can't really say
it's beautiful, but it's typical ofa really nice, lively mountain town.
There's one day a week that has a marketwhich I've been to, it's really fun.
It has lots of hotels.
It has the thermal baths.

(43:26):
It has lots of shops for people who needto get stuff to go hiking or skiing.
It's a major center for all of this.
And if you go from there on thisvery windy road, you get to a park
that's called La Maison des Loups.
There you go.
I went with my husband once, youknow, he takes me on these roads
and I go, Oh my God, where are we?

(43:47):
And we're going to fall off thiscliff and that'll be the end of it,
you know, and lo and behold, at theend of it is this nature preserve,
and it's an interesting center.
It's actually a center that'sfor preserving wolves from all
over the world and for doingresearch on them genetically.
But at different times of the year,during the holidays and everything, it
is open, and it's a great place to gowith children, and not just by, you know,

(44:11):
I love, I am fascinated by wolves, so Iwant to just go up and say hi, you know.
But it's great, it's a wholebig park, with, you know, a
whole bunch of acres, and it's afascinating nature site to visit.

I haven't been, so this is when I should go, because,

It said, you know, it's got educational things and it explains about
the lives of wolves and how they're notthese big bad animals and stuff like that.
And they're kind of neat because theyhave wolves from all over, and the
Canadian, and American wolves, andthe Siberian wolves, and I don't know
if they get along with each other.
I hope so.
And then we get into, of course,this is the other half of what

(44:47):
it is to be in the Ariège.
Just mentioning a few things.
I mentioned very quickly at the beginning,40% of the department is this regional
park called the Parc Naturel Régionaldes Pyrénées Ariégeoises which means
it's got a certain amount of protection.
It's kind of like the Bureau of LandManagement would be in the States.

(45:08):
There are villages, there are gites,there are all kinds of things inside
this area, but it's a vast area.
It's got some of the skiing sites, it'sgot some lakes, it's got valleys, and
it goes high up into the mountains.
Just to mention veryquickly, there are two lakes.
One of them is the Réserve d'Orlu, whichalso has hiking trails and an animal

(45:28):
sanctuary and a few tiny villages, andsome gîtes that are inside this area.
It's a really beautiful part ofthe higher part of the mountains,
but it's not inaccessible.
And in the summer, there's actuallya shuttle that can take you, if you
want to go and do some serious hiking,they actually are nice enough to take
you to a starting point higher up.

(45:48):
And then there's the area around thelake of Bethmale, which is in the
region called the Couserans, on thesouthwestern side of Ariège, and the
Bethmale is famous for its cheese.

Oh!

Oh, I expected you to say cheese away

No, I didn't.

You know, Bethmale is one of my favorite cheeses.
It's a cow cheese from the Pyrenees.
That's a hard cheese, but not super,super, super, super hard, like a Conté.
It's a little airy inside.
It's very delicious.
I really love it a lot.
And it's made in the town,the little village of Bethmal,
which is right on the lake.

(46:27):
It's very pretty.
I've walked the lake a few times.
What's nice here is that, if you go,you can do a cheese tasting, you can
see how they make it, but also itgives you an idea of what a typical
Pyrenees town or village looks like.
Because they have a special kind ofarchitecture, which of course, you know,
from your brother's house and area too,that's very specific to the Pyrenees.

So.
I've had Bethmale cheese.
It's just not one of my favorites.
It's like a Tomme kind of cheese.

It's like a Tomme, but with a bit more taste.
And now, maybe because there's more demandfor it, they also are making a Bethmale
that's made with sheep's milk, not justwith cow's milk, you know, which...
I might like that better.
Sheep's milk is always sharper.
It's always a stronger taste in theend, but it's a very nice little area
and this is a place where if you godown into this valley, because it's,

(47:14):
you go up and then down into the valleywhere the lake is, you have two or
three very cute little villages and thenthese little chapels that are very old.
It's just very picturesque anda very sweet area to walk around
in if you're not into going tothe higher part at 3000 meters.

Yeah, this is easier to do, this is for most people can do this.

Yeah, this is really nice.
And then you have skiing.
Believe it or not, of course, this isnot as famous as the Alps, but there's
a lot of skiing in the Pyrenees, a lot.

But the season is short.
So like it's been like it started snowing10 days ago and they're probably going
to have snow for a month and that's it.

This year, there was no snow earlier.
I think that was the problem, right?

The season is short.
This is not a place where youcan, you know, book a vacation
a year early to go ski there.
This is not the Rockies, okay?
We have snow sometimes.
And if there's snow, locals go skiing.
But you wouldn't come from acrossthe world just to go skiing there,
because you would never be sure ifthere's any snow be snow or not.
But I think it depends because to thepart that's Haute-Garonne and to the

(48:21):
west, the stations are higher up andthey are more permanent ski stations.
The Ariège, it's more, there'sa lot of cross country.
There are smaller stations.
They're not stations for people whoare super expert skiers, I think.
There are two or three close toAx-les-Thermes, Font-Romeu is,
I think it's technically in theAude, but it's that whole area.

(48:42):
And yeah, and it depends on the year.
Like this year, you're right, there wasno snow until recently, but now there's
oodles, and oodles, and oodles of snow.
So there's high avalanchewarnings at this point.
Okay, so there's a meter ofsnow, but in the Rockies, you
have five, six meters of snow.
So it's not the same.
Of the ski stations you mentioned, asyou mentioned, Ascou, Goulier, Méjean,

(49:03):
Donnezans, Les Mondolmes, and Guzé.
I've skied at Les Mondolmes and Guzé.
The other ones, I'venever even heard of them.

And Ax Trois Domaines, no?
That's the biggest one, wellthat's the big one, that's the
big one, that's near Ax, yeah.
And then there's the Plateau de Beille,which is very close to where my friends
have a small country house, which is greatfor doing a little cross country skiing.
It's really pretty.
It's a nice plateau high up, youget to see some of the mountains.
It's family skiing.

(49:29):
This is, you know, it's not super serious.
You know, my stepson is aski monitor in Courchevel.
I don't talk about the Rockies, I talkabout the Alps because that's what I know.

Right, but there's more snow in Courchevel usually.

Oh, well, the Alps, you know, usually gets a lot more
snow and it's a lot more serious,serious, serious, you know, downhill.
Although there are some stationson the western side of the Pyrenees
that have more skiing than thesestations do, but it's kind of nice.
It's just all, I wouldsay it's all very low key.
If you're around in the wintertime andyou want to get a little feel for these

(50:02):
kinds of things in the Pyrenees, andyou're not here on a vacation, that's
just for skiing, you know, you're notgoing to go to these places for that.

All right, we got to get back to the food
and then call it a day, woman!
Food, food!
Talk about food!
Okay.
The Bethmale and the cheeses, theLe Moulis, which you probably would
like more because it's a littlebit sharper than the Bethmale.
Again, you're not, theseare not your favorites.
Mountain cheeses, not so much.
I like them, see, I like them.
It's like the Comté, I like.
Though the three mountain cheeses thatare harder are the Bethmale, Le Moulis,

(50:31):
and the Tomme des Pyrénées , whichis very creamy and very, very mild.
It's the least tasty in the senseof it's the creamiest, really.
And then you have La Croustades.
Yes, I like that.
Yeah.
Well, you know, we both do.
What can you do?
It's sugar, you know, it's...

And then, they have, I didn't know, I've never had
it, I wonder if it's good, it'scalled a "velouté de chataignes".
Have you ever had it?

I've not had it, but I'm sure I would like it because
I like everything chestnuts.

Oh, you like everything chestnut?
Okay.
See, you have to like everything chestnut.
That's not my thing.
Yeah.
I just, I don't know why I'm just,okay, I can take it or leave it.
And then the last thing, I don'tknow how to pronounce it, it's
the Ariège version of cassoulet.

Okay.
It looks like Mounjetade to me.
Okay.
But Mounjetade is what I would say.
We'll call it Mounjetadeif you want, that's fine.

It's exactly that.
It's the Ariège version of a cassoulet.
Don't ask what the difference is.
I haven't figured out.
I don't either.
No, but it looked pretty good when I waslooking at the pictures of it yesterday.

So in summary, in summary, my friend, lovely place to go
for a leisurely vacation, especiallyfor families, especially for people
with young kids that want to havea little something to do every day.
You know, an outing that we cango do as a family every day, but
that also wanna take it easy.

(51:47):
And perhaps enjoy your swimming pooltime or some good meals or make crepes
together, or something, you know, likethe sort of low key vacation that we
enjoy in the Southwest that I think wouldsuit lots of people as well, but not the
sort of place you go because, you know,you need to check things off your list.

(52:10):
This is a low key, lovely area.

Absolutely, and it's less expensive than a
lot of other parts of France.
True.
And lots and lots andlots of places to rent.

Right, lots of these places have, because lots of French
people have a family home of some sort,and sometimes they don't use them very
much, and sometimes they rent them out.

And they have gîtes and they have Airbnb, and all that kind of
stuff, you know, pretty much everywhere.

Yeah, not a lot of hotels - hotels.
This is a sort of place where you shouldplan on cooking for yourself, going to
the local stores, making your own stuff.
There are some restaurants and somehotels, but not lots of them, you know.
If one of the things I have doneis look at how many visitors
does the Ariège get every year?

(52:57):
Well, of all the departments aroundhere, it's the one that gets the least.
Yes, it gets the least because, youknow, Haute-Garonne gets the most,
surprisingly, because of Airbus.
There's a lot of visitorsthat just come for work.
Aude gets quite a bit, Pyrénées Orientalegets a bit, but the Ariège not as many.

(53:19):
I think you should go, I reallythink it's a beautiful place to
go spend a leisurely week or so.

Absolutely.
Merci Elyse!
De rien, Annie.
Au revoir.
Au revoir.

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(54:25):
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Isabelle wrote (55:07):
Annie, I really appreciate your podcast knowledge
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Your podcast has been sohelpful to me in so many ways.
Thank you.
Thank you, thank you for thekind words Isabel, and thank
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Very nice way to explore the city.
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The narrator is just perfect.
Well, thank you.
With the amount of information tokeep one interested, and we actually
pause in so many places to go insidechurches and the garden, just how we
wanted to explore the neighborhood.
Well, thank you verymuch, whoever you are.

(55:50):
And you know what?
I realize that most of you don't everthink, Oh, yippee, I'm going to the museum
and I will listen to the audio guide.
No, you won't.
If the last audio guide you listenedto was 20 years ago and it was
boring as can be, I hear you.
I know that audio guides can be boring.
I do not write boring audio guides, okay?

(56:12):
I just don't.
So, try one and I thinkyou will have a good time.
Another review of the Latin Quarter, thisperson knows me from the podcast probably.

He says (56:22):
Annie is just wonderful to listen to while walking the city.
We would have missed so muchhad it not been for her.
My wife and I are blown away.
Well, thank you very muchfor posting that review.
And if the podcast is leaving youwanting more, I offer two levels
of itinerary consultation on Zoom.
It's all explained onjoinusinfrance.com/boutique.

(56:45):
But yes, I'm still offering this serviceand still doing Zoom calls with people
who need a consult about their tripjust about every day, and that's a
wonderful thing for me to do, I reallyenjoy my time talking to my listeners.
The Nuit des Musées, Night at the Museum,it's back for its 20th edition, and it

(57:05):
will take place in Paris and in a lot ofcities in France and throughout Europe,
as a matter of fact, on May 18th, 2024.
Some places will have special conferences,some will have shows, concerts.
Most of them will be free and opento the public, but many require a

(57:26):
reservation, so make sure you visittheir website to see what's what.
Here are a few of the museums that areparticipating in Paris: La Conciergerie,
so that's next to Notre Dame, l'Orangerienext to the Louvre, L'Hôtel de la
Marine, also not far from the Louvre,on the Place de la Concorde, La Bourse

(57:47):
du Commerce, now we're on the other sideof the river, Les Halles, and that's
actually if you walk my food tour, you'llwalk right to the Bourse du Commerce.
In the Marais, they have the PicassoMuseum, the Museum of Jewish Art
and History, the Swedish Institute,which is also in the Marais,
the Centre Pompidou, ArchivesNationales, Maison de Victor Hugo.

(58:11):
And in Saint Germain des Prés,they have the Polish Library,
which I didn't know was there.
The Latin Quarter, there's theCurie Museum, and that's not open
very much, so it's fun that it'sgoing to be open on that Saturday.
Grande Galerie de l'Evolution, whichis a marvelous, marvelous place
that I think anybody should go to.
The Museum of the Paris Prefecturehas a special event planned.

(58:35):
I think it's going to be justspooky because it's about the,
it's about big thieves in Parisand murders and things like that.
I've been to that museum.
I should really do an episode about it.
It's a very fun museum, butit's not open all that much.
Le Musée du Service de santé des l'arméesat the Val-de-Grâce, so Val-de-Grâce

(58:56):
is another beautiful, beautiful place,not open very much, so it's, it would
be a great place to go, I think, ifI were in Paris that day, I might try
that one, or, oh, I'm not sure, maybeI would go to the École des Mines.
So that's by the Luxembourg Garden.
Yes, oh, I've beenwanting to go to that one.

(59:17):
They also have the Musée du Luxembourgis going to be open, the Musée de
l'Histoire de la Médecine, MaisonAuguste Comte, who was a philosopher.
So philosophers have museums in France.
How about that?
The Orsay Museum is going to be open.
Le Musée des Plans Reliefs, theLegion of Honour Museum, the Musée
de l'Armée, where Napoleon's tomb is.

(59:39):
The Canadian CulturalCentre is going to be open.
The Museum of Freemasons, didn'tknow it was there, but there you go.
Gustave Moreau, who was a painter.
Anyway, I didn't list all ofthem, if you can believe it.
Lots and lots of places are going to beopen in Paris on May 18 in the evening.

(59:59):
So most of these things start at 6 p.mand they go till 9 typically, okay?
So I hope you get to go, and if you arein Paris on May 18, look up the websites,
try to get a ticket as soon as possiblebecause they sell out, they will only
hand out so many tickets for these events.

(01:00:20):
My thanks to podcast editorsAnne and Cristian Cotovan
who produced the transcripts.
Next week on the podcast, thetrip report with Joel Jocelyn.
He spent 21 days solo in France.
He went to a lot of different placesand some of it worked out great and
some not so much, and it's importantto keep it real, so we discussed
his highs and his lows on this trip.

(01:00:43):
And I think you will enjoyhearing all about that.
Thank you so much for listening,and I hope you join me next time so
we can look around France together.
Au revoir!
The Join Us in France travelpodcast is written, hosted, and
produced by Annie Sargent andCopyright 2024 by AddictedToFrance.
It is released under a CreativeCommons, attribution, non-commercial,

(01:01:07):
no derivatives license.

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