Day 7 – Les Eyzies  to Montignac

September 25^th, 2002

the hologram

Today was one of those days you never forget. The kind of day one thinks of when they’re back in the office working late or caught in traffic. It was magical. It was a cold and foggy morning. We quickly put down the tent, threw the panniers together and sought refuge in the campground restaurant. It was closed but the owner must have taken pity on the two frozen souls. She set up a table near the fireplace and prepared a delicious spread of fresh bread, homemade jam and much appreciated café crème for us. After devouring the food, we wondered if we had just eaten her breakfast.

We warmed up by the fireplace until the fog burned off. Our first stop of the day was to attempt to get in to the Grotte de Font-de-Gaume, a cave with prehistoric art dating back 14,000 years. One of the last remaining original exhibitions open for public viewing in the world, there is always a waiting list. Several people had warned us that without reservations we would have very little chance of getting in, amazingly enough, there were two tickets available. In all honesty I wasn’t expecting much; a cheesy tourist spot with maybe one discernable image. To my great surprise, the exhibition was very moving and fascinating. Our guide compared the works to that of Michelangelo, and after seeing the artwork, the complexity, the detail, the dedication, the emotion, anyone would have to agree. It changed my perception of what prehistoric man was.

We then rode a short distance to La Roque Saint-Christophe, this prehistoric site is a 900m long series of terraces and caves on a sheer cliff face 30m above the Vézère River. This natural bastion was first used by Neanderthals 50,000 years ago. Entire villages were built on the side of these cliffs.

From there we rode to St-Léon-sur-Vézère, another “plus beaux villages du France”. Well what can we say, beautiful, peaceful and picturesque. We relaxed by the river and spent a few hours touring. We had planned to do 80km that day, but we decided that we would prefer to take our time and enjoy.

We continued north along the meandering Vézère River towards Montignac when we decided to do a side trip to Sergeac. This turned out to be an amazing detour. Sergeac is no more than 10 houses, and one of the prettiest little villages we have seen. As we wandered around snapping photos at every turn, we noticed an older man staring at us through his window. He came out of his house, greeted us with a warm and friendly smile and struck up a delightful conversation.  He then left us to tour but not before treating us to some homegrown grapes from his yard. After we took all our photos, we stopped by his house to thank him for his kindness and say goodbye. To our surprise and delight, he invited us in for some tea and biscuits with his wife and a friend. We had a wonderful time and were so very honored to have been invited into their home. It was getting late, so we pulled ourselves away and headed towards Montignac.

The bike ride along the Vézère River is hard to put in words. You must be there to understand it. The fall colors along this stretch of the route are absolutely brilliant. Overloaded with all these amazing experiences of the day, we half-hoped that Montignac would be ugly. It wasn’t.

We had a great dinner at a restaurant, got drunk and stumbled back to the tent. This had been a great day. We were starting to wonder if this was all just a hologram designed especially for bike tourers like us.