Bonjour, I'm Rick Steves, back with more of
the best of Europe. This time we're exploring some of the best of small town and countryside
France.... It's the Dordogne River valley. Thanks for
joining us! The Dordogne River Valley - with its dramatic
castles, pre-historic cave paintings, and prized cuisine is an unforgettable blend of
man-made and natural beauty. Once you get to know the region you wonder why more Americans
don't visit. Along with an idyllic canoe ride, we'll enjoy
the highlights of the Dordogne. Visit a goose farm, then savor the foie gras. Wander through
a lamp-lit castle, browse a country market, and marvel at the Sistine Chapel of the prehistoric
world. Then we cross into the next region to tour one very stern church, admire the
art of Toulouse Lautrec, and explore an imposing fortress city. France, the size of Texas, is made up of many
distinct regions - including the Dordogne, defined by a river by the same name. In the
Dordogne, we visit Sarlat, Beynac, and the famous caves of Lascaux before heading into
the Languedoc region where we'll explore Carcassonne and Albi. Six centuries ago, this lazy river - so peaceful
today - separated warring England and France. Imagine, the French were up in that castle
and the English were just across the river. They duked it out for so long that the conflict
became known as The Hundred Years War. Today's Dordogne River carries more holiday-goers
than weapons, as the region's economy relies heavily on tourism. For an invigorating break
from the car or train, you can explore the riverside castles and villages from a canoe. Kayaks and canoes are easy to hire. Rental
places line the river and they're happy to pick you up at an agreed-upon spot downstream. They're stable enough for beginners and I
can't think of a more relaxing way to enjoy both some great scenery and a little exercise.
My friend - and co-author of my France guidebook - Steve Smith has joined us. You can pop ashore whenever you like. There's
always a place to stow the canoe, and plenty of welcoming villages...like La Roque-Gageac. Whether you're joyriding by car or paddling
the Dordogne River, this town - a strong contender on all the "cutest towns in France" lists,
is a must see. Back on the river, delights are revealed with
each bend. The river's current varies depending on how much rain they've had. It's been dry
and today it's slow...perfect for a relaxing glide. We're finishing our ride in the feudal village
of Beynac. With the Dordogne River at your doorstep, a perfectly preserved medieval village
winds like a sepia-toned film set to the castle high above. In villages like this, there's
nothing to really "tour". It's just plain pretty. Stone roofs are typical of this region. Called
lauzes in French, the flat limestone rocks (gathered by farmers clearing their fields)
were a cheap and durable roofing material. The unusually steep pitch of the lauzes roofs
- which last about 200 years - helps distribute the weight down through the walls. Small vents
provide air circulation. Local farmers are quick to sing the roofs praises. Rick: And how old is this house?
Farmer: (In French). Steve: 1760 roughly.
Rick: Is it waterproof? Farmer: (In French).
Steve: You want these holes that we can see through here so air comes through and helps
dry out the tree trunks that are in here. The oak, etc. but it stays dry.
Rick: Do they build roofs like this today? Steve: (To farmer in French).
Farmer: (In French). Steve: They do but its people like with a
lot of money who want to do this; 250 years ago this was a poor man's roof. Today it's
a rich man's hobby. Beynac's brooding, cliff-crowning château
soars 500 feet above the Dordogne River. Its design was state-of-the-art in its day. And
it comes with a view fit for a king. During the Hundred Years' War - more than a century
of skirmishes between the French and the English back in the 13 and 14 hundreds - the castle
of Beynac was on the front lines. The sparsely furnished castle takes you back. Stone lamps
light the way. In the knights' mess hall, you almost feel like the cooks are just taking
a break. And even back then there were manners: park your sword at the end of the table. The leading noble family of the Dordogne ruled
from this castle. Through the Middle Ages, here in the great room - the closest thing
to a throne room - the decisions that effected the realm were made. During the Hundred Years War the Castle of
Beynac flip-flopped between French and English control several times. Negotiations were worked
out in this room. The subjects of the realm would gather in
the courtyard to learn their destiny. Their noble lord would stand here and proclaim
"Now you are French" or "now you are English" ... deal with it. Long before the age of great castles, humbler
groups in the Dordogne found refuge in caves. La Roque St. Christophe, a series of river-carved
terraces, has provided shelter to people here for 50,000 years. While the terraces were
inhabited in prehistoric times, the exhibit you'll see today is medieval. The official
recorded history goes back to 976 A.D., when people settled here to steer clear of Viking
raiders who'd routinely sail up the river. Back then in this part of Europe, the standard
closing of a prayer wasn't "amen," but, "and deliver us from the Norseman, amen." A clever relay of river watchtowers kept an
eye out for raiders. When they came, residents gathered up their kids, hauled up their animals
- as you can imagine with the help of this big recreated winch - and pulled up the ladders.
While there's absolutely nothing old here except for the carved-out rock, it's easy
to imagine the entire village - complete with butcher, baker, and even candlestick-maker
- in this family-friendly exhibit. Nearby, Sarlat is the pedestrian-friendly
main town of the river valley. It's just the right size - large enough to have a cinema
with four screens, but small enough so that everything is an easy meander from the town
center. It's the handiest home base for exploring the Dordogne. There are no blockbuster sights here. Still,
it's an inviting tangle of traffic-free cobblestone lanes and handsome buildings, lined with foie
gras shops (geese just hate Sarlat), and - in the summer - stuffed with tourists. Sarlat's elaborate stonework recalls its glory
century was from about 1450 to 1550, after the Hundred Years' War. Loyal to the French
cause - through thick and thin and a century of war - Sarlat was rewarded by the French
king, who gave lots of money to rebuild the town in stone. Sarlat's new nobility built noble homes to
match. The town's most impressive buildings date from this prosperous era, when the Renaissance
style was in vogue. It's Market Day and the city is jammed as
it has been for centuries of Saturdays. Everything's fresh and local - so seasonal that shoppers
can tell the month by what's on sale. Steve: This has been going on for 1,000 years
almost, since the Middle ages. Rick: What's this region k own for?
Steve: Well the Dordogne is famous for three things: walnuts, cakes and nuts and...
Rick: So this is walnuts... Steve: That's the walnut table. Truffles which
are a mushroom, you'll find only fresh in the winter so you won't see it in the market
today. And the biggie, what people come to this area for, foie gras, which is the luxurious
liver of force fed geese and ducks. In fact people come to this area more I think for
that than they do the famous caves or the castles or the river. That's kind of the raison
d'etre of the area, from a culinary perspective. Rick: ...try some, goose liver okay.
Steve: Which one is best? Vendor: The best is just one piece of duck
liver or goose liver one piece. Steve: So it's pure? Just that.
Rick: Wow, that's good. Steve: Hmm, let's taste the difference. This
should be stronger right? Vendor: Duck is different. Duck is a strong,
goose is a sweet. Steve: Yeah, that's a good description. One
strong, one sweet. Do you notice the difference? Rick: Um hum, um hum. This "Square of the Geese" is a reminder that
birds are serious business here, and have been since the Middle Ages. Many question
the morality of force feeding geese to make the foie gras. To learn more about this, we
are heading into the countryside to actually visit a goose farm. For generations, the Mazet family has raised
geese right here. Nathalie - clearly in love with the country life - enthusiastically shows
guests around her idyllic farm. Each evening, she leads a family-friendly tour explaining
the age old tradition of la gavage...force feeding the geese to fatten their livers to
make the much loved goose liver pate...or foie gras. Nathalie: In the fall we have 1,000 geese
each year. And this one are six weeks old. And during the day they are outside and they
come back inside during the night. A goose cannot stay in a small box. She will die.
She need to walk, she need to eat grass. These birds are migrating and before doing the migration
they eat a lot. They make foie gras. They stalk energy on the liver to be able to fly
Rick: So it's their natural gas tank. Nathalie: It's the natural way to stalk energy,
yeah. Nathalie explains why locals see the force-feeding
as humane (the same as raising any other animal for human consumption). French enthusiasts
of la gavage say the animals are calm, in no pain, and are designed to gorge naturally.
Dordogne geese live lives at least as comfy as other farm animals that many people have
no problem eating, and they are slaughtered as humanely as any non-human can expect in
this food-chain existence. Rick: Does this not hurt the geese to put
the tube down? Nathalie: No, no. The tube can go very easily
on the top of the stomach because a goose naturally can eat big stone or a big corn
on a cob. Rick: A goose can eat a corn on a cob?
Nathalie: Yes. So the tube is not very big for a goose. To have good foie gras the geese
must have good life outside or in during the The region's cuisine is a big draw here. We're
dropping by a favorite restaurant of Steve's to enjoy the local specialties. Gourmet eaters
flock to this region for its goose, duck, pates, white asparagus, and more. Waitress: (In French).
Rick: Okay. Thank you, merci. You're going to have to help me. What are, these are three
different foie gras, right? Steve: Welcome to the Dordogne. Alright, you've
got three different foie gras here. This one's confi, which is foie gras cooked in its own
fat. The middle one, they call it confi au docheax, which means cooked with like a veil
of chiffon around it and the third one is a straight foie gras.
Rick: On you know I can taste a difference. There's a clear difference. I like this very
much. From about 18,000 until 10,000 B.C., long
before Stonehenge and the pyramids, back when mammoths and saber-toothed cats still roamed
the earth, prehistoric people painted deep inside caves in this part of Europe. These
weren't just crude doodles. They are huge and sophisticated projects executed by artists
and supported by an impressive culture - the Magdalenians. The region's limestone cliffs - honeycombed
with painted caves - are unique on this planet. Tourists gather nearby at Lascaux, home of
the region's - and the world's - most famous cave paintings. These caves were discovered accidentally in
1940 by four kids and their dog. Over the next couple decades, about a million visitors
climbed through this prehistoric wonderland inadvertently tracking in fungus on their
shoes and changing the \humidity and the temperature with their breathing. In just 15 years, the
precious art deteriorated more than in the 15,000 years before that. The caves were closed
to the public. Visitors can now experience the wonder of Lascaux by touring an adjacent
replica. When their time comes, visitors are called
to meet their guide for a look at the precisely copied cave called Lascaux II. Guide: Then we are in the oxen room, the most
spectacular room of Lascaux. It's a sacred place. We don't live in a church, they never
lived in the caves. And it's a huge composition, it's a calculated composition because they
have taken advantage of the slip of rock to relate in a circle two groups almost facing
each other. And in the center of this composition they have united the three principal animals
of Lascaux: horse, ox and deer. Rick: Is this a hunting scene?
Guide: No it's not a hunting scene because on the walls the hunter doesn't exist. They
never tell the everyday life, the meaning is more complex.
Rick: What is the biggest animal? Guide: This bull is the largest painting in
the cave of 16 feet from the top of the horn to the tip of the tail. The guide explains that this 600 animal multi-cave
composition was the work of a complex society, the Magdalenian's. Their culture allowed for
skilled artists to work over an extended period of time in this sacred place. Guide: They fix maybe on the walls a dream,
image...and the image will be able to cross generations; the image becomes the memory
of the society. The alta fresco is supposed to be around 17,000 years old. But compared
to the beginning of the humanity which was born in Africa 3 million years ago, Lascaux
it was yesterday they were like us. The region has many more examples of prehistoric
cave painting. And the nearby National Museum of Prehistory provides an instructive background. This modern museum houses over 18,000 bones,
stones, and fascinating little doodads - all uncovered locally. Artifacts are originals
and show that while the Magdalenian people lived 15,000 years ago, they were far more
advanced than your text book cavemen. Skeletons were discovered draped in delicate jewelry.
Stag teeth and tiny shells were it seems lovingly drilled to be strung into necklaces. These
barbed spearheads and fish hooks would work well today. Finely carved spear throwers show
impressive realism for something three times as old as the oldest pyramids. Imagine flickering
flames from these oil lamps lighting those art-covered caverns. Today, as we ponder the prehistoric caves
and artifacts of the Magdalenian people here in the Dordogne we can marvel at how much
we actually have in common with these people and how sophisticated their culture was so
long ago. A short drive south from the Dordogne takes
us into the region of Languedoc. This region's hard fought past and independent
spirit is evident in its old fortifications, fine art, and in a culture distinct from the
rest of France that survives to this day. The fortress city of Carcassonne is a 13th
century world of towers, turrets, and cobblestone alleys. This is Europe's ultimate walled fortress
city. While it's packed with tourists mid-day, it's all yours and evocative as can be early
and late. The city's stern ramparts evoke a time when
defenses were stronger than offenses...and the only way to beat a place like this was
a starve 'em out siege. Charlemagne laid siege to this place...and after several frustrating
years, he ran out of patience. While the outer ramparts seem mighty enough,
moats added to a fortified city's defenses. While not really filled with water and alligators,
moats were generally just a dangerous no man's land designed to expose attackers. Small square
holes on the inner wall once supported timbers which supported defensive walk ways. Modern shops fill buildings that date from
Carcassonne's golden age - the 1100s, when troubadours sang ballads of ideal love, chivalry
was in vogue, and a pragmatic spirit of tolerance pervaded everything.
This became a center of the Cathars - a heretical group of Christians who thrived around here
from the 11th through the 13th centuries. They saw life as a battle between good (the
spiritual) and bad (the material). To the Cathars material things were evil and of the
devil. As France was working to consolidate its central power, it clamped down on feisty
regions like this...especially if they were sympathetic to heretical groups like the Cathars. The region is dotted with evocative and remote
castle ruins which provided places of desperate last refuge for Cathars and remind of bloody
struggles. When driven out of Carcassonne, many Cathars hid in the nearby castles of
Lastours. Back in Paris, the king wanted to tighten
his grip on southern France. In Rome the pope needed to make it clear there was only one
acceptable form of Christianity and it was Roman. Both found self-serving reasons to
wage a genocidal war against the Cathar people, who never amounted to more than 10 percent
of the local population. After a terrible period of torture and mass burnings, the Cathars
were wiped out. In 1321 the last Cathar was burned. The Cathars were also called Albigensians
- named after this nearby town, Albi. Its massive Roman Catholic cathedral was the final
nail in the Cathar coffin. Big and bold, it made the Church's zero tolerance policy towards
heretical thinking perfectly clear. The cathedral looks less like a church and more like a fortress
- on purpose. The interior looks essentially as it did in
1500 - and its art comes with a stern message. In the Last Judgment Painting, the dead come
out of the ground with an accounting of their deeds, both good and bad, printed in ledgers
on their chests. The saved look confident and comfortable. And those whose ledgers don't
add up look pretty nervous. A wide selection of gruesome punishments awaits the sinners.
These graphic scenes were designed to frighten wide-eyed parishioners into conformity with
Church dictates. Next to the church, the former home of Albi's
archbishop contains the world's largest collection of art by Henri Toulouse-Lautrec. The museum
displays his work chronologically, letting you follow the evolution of his art with his
fascinating life's story. Toulouse-Lautrec, who was born here in Albi
in 1864, was crippled from his youth. Because of this, he was on the fringe of society,
and had an affinity for people who didn't fit in. He made his mark painting the Parisian underclass
with an intimacy possible only by someone with his life experience. His subjects were
from bars, brothels, and cabarets. Henri was particularly fascinated by cancan dancers
- whose legs moved with an agility he would never experience. In the 1890s Henri frequented brothels and
befriended many prostitutes. He respected the women, feeling both fascination and empathy
toward them. The prostitutes accepted Henri as he was. They allowed him into their world...and
he sketched candid portraits. Eventually Toulouse-Lautrec established his
unique style: colors - garish, subject matter - hidden worlds, moralism - none. Toulouse-Lautrec's advertising posters were
his bread and butter. He was an innovative advertiser, creating simple, bold lithographic
images for posters. Posters, such as this one promoting the famous
Moulin Rouge, established his business reputation in Paris. Successful as he was, his career
was short. Toulouse-Lautrec had a self-destructive lifestyle.
He died at the age of 37, alcoholic, depressed, and paranoid. He was unmourned and unappreciated
by the art establishment. Thankfully his mother and a best friend recognized his genius and
saved his work. They first offered it to the Louvre, which refused. But in 1922, the mayor
of Albi accepted the collection and hung it here. A wise move. This corner of France offers a perfect storm
of countryside experiences - evocative castles, really old art, well fed geese, all with a
chance to hike through history, savor some rich food, and then work it off with a little
exercise. I hope you've enjoyed our Dordogne adventure
- and our quick side trip to Languedoc. The more I understand France, the more I appreciate
this fascinating and complex culture. Thanks for joining us. I'm Rick Steves. Until next
time, keep on traveling. Au revoir. Credits: Feel good, gut, hey. This became a center of the Cathars, a heretical
group of Christians. A heretical group of Christians. Rick: It's more complex.
Steve: [Makes face], Did you hear that? Guide: One here. One here...
