Castles, Cathars and Caves

17/09/2016

https://youtu.be/uIEvmhbOKpA

Footage of some of the stunning sights in the Aude department near Carcassonne and Bram. www.globalvision.ie

09/03/2016

Drone photo of Bram from the rugby/soccer club at 100m altitude.

13/01/2016

I'm happy to announce that our Gite is now ready for the summer (that part of the year when a yellow ball appears in the sky). We are 15 minutes from Carcassonne airport and located in the midst of the largest single wine producing region in the world (a fortunate coincidence). Please like, share and above all, plan a visit. Check availability as some weeks, like the bottle of Rosé in front of me, have disappeared already.
www.maisonsaintjules.com

05/01/2016

If the return to work and the weather are getting you down, we have weeks still available between July and October for our 5 bedroom Gite in the centre of the town of Bram. The house has all conveniences including Gym, Hot Tub, WIFI and secure parking if required. We are 1200metres from the UNESCO site The Canal Du Midi and 23km from the Carcassonne medieval city UNESCO site. Contact: [email protected] for prices and availability.

04/12/2015

A short trip down the road from us in Bram is the enchanting village of Rennes-le-Château. There are two schools of thought about this mysterious place. One has it hiding the greatest secret in history, the other that it is the biggest hoax of the 20th century.

Either way it is a tale that has captured the popular imagination like few others in recent years, spawning endless books, TV programs and the blockbuster novel and Hollywood film the Da Vinci Code.

As myth, fact or a mixture of both, it has all the classic ingredients of the best adventure stories; lost parchments, secret societies, esoteric codes, buried treasure, and the ultimate bombshell — a forbidden truth so vast that if revealed it would rock Christianity itself to its foundations.

The begins in the 1880s. Rennes-le-Château was home to an old church, dedicated to Mary Magdalene, that had fallen into disrepair after years of neglect.

The village’s priest Bérenger Saunière drew up plans to renovate the church. Whilst Saunière himself was of humble means, he managed to secure enough funding to begin the work, which commenced in 1887.

It was during these renovations that Saunière would make a discovery that would not only transform his own personal fortunes but launch a thousand conspiracy theories about Rennes-le-Château that endure to this day.

The exact nature of what he discovered varies between tellings, but the most popular version has it that Saunière found some parchments concealed inside a hollow pillar of the church’s altar.

Some of the parchments detailed royal genealogies dating back centuries, whilst others contained enigmatic writings which appeared to conceal some kind of hidden message.

Shortly after his discovery, Saunière would begin to act in a strange manner. He would excavate large parts of his church, and on several occasions he and his housekeeper Marie Dénarnaud would be seen digging in the cemetery at night. The municipal council even lodged an official complaint about the priest disturbing the graves.

In a diary entry around the time, Saunière makes enigmatic reference to what he had found, using but one word — ‘secret’.

To be continued or find out more for yourself by taking a trip.

25/11/2015

Perched on the rocky heights of the High Corbières, at an altitude of 800 metres, Peyrepertuse emerges from the midst of the Mediterranean scrub land known as the "garrigue" and overlooks the small village of Duilhac-sous-Peyrepertuse. This huge fortress covers the same area as the citadel of Carcassonne. Each year the largest medieval festival in the South of France takes place here and many troupes perform in the castle and in a reconstructed medieval village.

Open all year round with the exception of the second half of January.

17/11/2015

http://www.discover-carcassonne.com/en/winter-beautiful-too-9

28/10/2015

Fancy a weekend in Aude in January. Flights can be purchased from as little as €158 return for 2 people flying from Dublin to Carcassonne. Arrive at 1715hrs on Friday and depart at 1430hrs on Sunday. Airport collection and drop off as well as meals and tours can be arranged on request. Contact [email protected] for more details.

23/09/2015

23/09/2015

In the Middle Ages Béziers belonged to the Viscounts of Carcassonne. When the first Cathar Crusade arrived in the Languedoc this was their initial target.

On 22 July 1209 the Crusader army arrived at Béziers on the periphery of the area in the Languedoc where Cathars flourished. There were believed to be around 200 Cathar Parfaits in the town among a much greater population of sympathetic Catholics. The townspeople, believing their city walls impregnable, were careless, and the town was overrun while the leading Crusader churchmen and nobles were still planning their siege.

Today nothing remains of the Viscounts' Castle in Béziers, but the town still bears scars inflicted by the Crusaders. It was here, when asked how the crusaders were to differentiate between Cathars and Catholics that the Abbott-comander of the Crusade gave the famous command "Kill them all - the Lord will recognise His own". An estimated 20,000 were slaughtered, ironically the vast majority were Catholics killed by Catholics.

07/09/2015

Built under the reign of Louis XIV between 1666 and 1681, the Canal du Midi is home to 328 structures (locks, aqueducts, tunnels, bridges, etc.) and constitutes a major example of hydraulic engineering of the modern age. Its creator successfully combined technical prowess with a concern for architectural and landscape aesthetics.

Listed a Grand Site de France, since 1996, the Canal du Midi has also been recognised as World Heritage by UNESCO, which described it as “one of the most extraordinary examples of civil engineering of the modern age which paved the way to the industrial revolution”.

The Canal du Midi, home to many interesting sites and open from March to November, has become a key destination in river tourism. Becoming increasingly popular from the 1960s onwards, hordes of tourists have now been visiting the Canal since the 1980s. It runs through major towns and cities such as Toulouse, Castelnaudary, Carcassonne, Trèbes, Béziers, Narbonne, Sète, and Agde, among others.

04/09/2015

The different wines of the Languedoc.