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Souillac; Sarlat; Montignac; Thenon; Perigueux; Le Bugue; Le Buisson de Cadouin; Souillac.

 

As we headed back to Sarlat to take photographs we passed a large group of men standing around their cars on the edge of some woodland. Despite the blazing sunshine most of them wore the hunting / shooting / fishing uniform of greenish sleeveless quilted tops and hats with feathers in and many had bandoliers of cartridges.  So it's Sunday!  Let's go and kill something!                All over France, because of the large areas of woodland, we saw road signs warning us that wild animals were likely to be crossing the road. A very large proportion of these woodlands had signs indicating that they were hunting areas.  We weren't out and about much at dawn nor dusk, but we never saw any animals crossing. In two urban areas within the Dordogne region we saw two red squirrels dead on the road and one scrumpled thing which might once have been a pine marten. But that was it - not even any more roadkill.    Two hunters are out in the woods when one of them collapses. He doesn't seem to be breathing and his eyes are glazed. The other guy whips out his phone and calls the emergency services. He gasps: "My friend is dead! What can I do?" The operator says: "Calm down, I can help. First, let's make sure he's dead." There is a silence, then a shot is heard. Back on the phone, the guy says: "OK, now what?"    Montignac is a handsome little town, as smartly medieval as any other in the region, yet not so frantically visited by tourists.   It has been said that the French build only disposable cars. We certainly saw very few old ones & only a couple of my favourites, the Citroen DS, but at Thenon we discovered an auto-jumble with a few fabulous classic cars and some pre-1930s as well.     Perigueux in the Green Guide didn't look much, just churches, but in reality it was most impressive. Although as old in origin it seemed far more modern and purposeful than other towns around here. It was evidently, even on a Sunday, a thriving and important centre. It has a massive cathedral and spacious tree-lined squares and it warranted more time spending there. But we're not retired, like Mr and Mrs Mercedes, and until we are I guess we'll keep hopping about like Mr and Mrs McManic instead.   On the N2089 we saw the by now familiar black silhouettes of human figures set up to show the location of fatal road crashes, but quite shockingly there were seven spread out along a stretch of about two and a half miles.     Top  01 - 030902  04 - 060902   070902   08 - 090902   100902   11 - 140902   16 - 190902