November 25th Figeac

November 25^th Figeac

It was really cold this morning with a light fog in patches which trapped the cold and dampness down where we were, but after breakfast we layered up, gloved our hands, and applied scarves to our necks, and ventured out to follow the city walking map we had.

Our first stop was the Cathedral which we dutifully entered, nothing really to comment on, nice enough but nothing special. There were nice views from outside the church though  over the village to the countryside in the near distance. 

Not graffiti but reflections/lights cast by the sun through the stained glass windows

Pretty stained glass window

 We continued our walk finding interesting building after interesting building, the guide we had explained a bit about the highlighted ones, like the open lofts on the top of some of them which had been used by tanners or others for drying skins or fruit or vegetables for preserving for the winter.

We had to stop for a coffee quite soon and chose a little bar with outside seating in a large square (only for the incredibly hardy or the smokers) and a lovely cosy atmosphere inside. The coffee was great, two large cups with half black coffee and a large jug of steaming hot milk on the side for refills or in our case diluting, the caffeine. We enjoyed it so much and it was so fairly priced (4.20 for the lot) that this place became our “local” while we were in town.

Once we had thawed sufficiently and our bellies satisfied we returned to our walk, picking up some fresh bread and sweet treats on our way, before heading back to the truck for lunch. I had made up a large pot of vegetable  soup in anticipation of hunger and coldness, so we sat down to that once it was hot, and ate it with cheese and bread, licking our lips with pleasure as we went.

After lunch we headed back into the town to visit the museum about script, which was inspired by this being Champillion’s birthplace. Unfortunately for me, the highlight was the building really, and you could see that from the outside. Though we had audioguides in English, the vast majority of other information including the videos, were in French. I’m sure some of you would have loved it here, all about Egyptians and pieces of artefacts with hieroglyphics and early writing on them, but I was quite quickly replete as was Hilary, and even Diana (the museum queen) said she was disappointed. So we headed back to our favourite coffee shop and recaffeinated and defrosted again.

Hilary standing on a giant replica Rosetta Stone

In the Museum

The outside of the museum. The house Champillion was born in

These long evenings (it gets pretty dusky by five) means we have issues with power in the truck if we aren’t plugged in to the mains. We have a reserve battery, but it is solar powered so if it is grey during the day, or we are parked in the shade, it doesn’t recharge very well. Also, though we are careful with lights and things, it just doesn’t have the energy to last for 5 hours in the evening. This park didn’t have electricity but it did have a facility for charging batteries so we ran our cord out to that to replenish our supplies this evening, but it still means we head to bed a bit earlier (usually) and don’t tend to read at night so much, or if we do we negotiate the use of our one still functioning head torch, and the others settle in for the night.