A day in Cahors

A great start to the day with a lovely skype chat with my good friend Suzi and her gorgeous family and then we got the wonderful news that Hannah has been accepted into the International School of Toulouse.  We are so delighted as she will have a great time and I'm sure will fit in quickly and make friends.  It is a lovely school with very supportive staff and families and she is excited to be starting soon.  We need to finalise a contract with the Teacher aide then work with the school to find a best starting date so she may start this term or at the start of next term which is in five weeks.  The terms are very short here with only three weeks till holidays.

We then headed north in the direction of Cahors.  A beautiful old medieval French town.  We arrived and found a park no problem and then went off in the search for lunch.  After a couple of misses where no one could speak English and we weren't really sure if the food would be gluten free we found a lovely cafe.  We thought we would try and do lunch a bit cheaper today so had no frills with just a main each and no drinks - so we saved a few penny's.  We think that next weekend if we go away we might make up some baguettes and sandwiches and have a picnic instead.  Every town has gorgeous bakeries and cheap pizza and creperies but for gluten free diners it is a lot more challenging.

One of the narrow alleyways in Cahors.

                                                                                                                   

 Part of the medieval town.

Having a rest at a WW1 memorial

So after a meal of steak and chips we walked the streets of Cahors admiring all the age old houses and trying to work out what all the different pulleys and grates on the outside of the houses were for.  The streets are very narrow and we decided that this would not be a good place to own a big 7 seater car like ours.  We had a great explore and then walked down to the 14th Century medieval bridge Pont Valentre.  It was truly magnificent and quite awe-inspiring that something over 600 years old is still standing and you can walk over it and climb some of the stairs that lead to the towers.

 The bridge of Cahors

Jasper walking over the gate that opens the lock.

On the riverbank looking at Pont Valentre

We then walked back into the village and found a cafe for an ice cream and a coffee.  We had planned to go onto Rocamdour which has an amazing chateau perched on a hill.  We had done alot of walking already and didn't think the kids would be that impressed if we made them walk up a step hill to look at yet another old building.  So instead we decided to take a short walk back to the Cathedrale St-Etienne in  Cahors.  It was a wonderful building, so ornate with some 14th century fresco's.  The monks certainly knew how to hide themselves from the world as inside the church through a doorway and chapel was a lovely courtyard.  Very peaceful and private.

The courtyard inside the Cathedral.

We then decided to head for home and will come back to Rocamdour another day with friends of family.

Today we decided to try out a different Church and even though it was advertised as English speaking it was actually French speaking.  We stayed for some songs and prayers but left before the sermon as thought it might be a bit hard going.  We instead went into Pibrac which is a nearby village, to a playground we had spotted on a previous occasion.  It was a great playground and the kids had a good time.

Am looking forward to the week ahead with organising the Teacher aide for Hannah and getting a start date for her for school now that she has been accepted.  On Monday the children have the day off school for parent teacher interviews.  My interviews are in the afternoon so we will be able to have a relaxing morning at home.