Day 2: CARCASSONE - LAGRASSE - FONTFROIDE ABBEY - LLORET DE MAR
Sunday, April 10, 2011
Today we set the alarm at 9 in the morning. We will take advantage of the bed a little more before we set off for Lagrasse and the Fornfroide Abbey.
After picking up everything and having coffee in the apartment, about 10 we get going.
We check out at the Adonis La Barbacane Residence and we go directly to load the car and go to the Pont Vieux, from where we have seen that there are spectacular views of La Cité.
Carcassonne
Today is very cloudy and very airy. It seems incredible how time has changed in one day. Today I don't forget anything with my wardrobe.
Carcassonne
Once we arrive, we park on the riverbank and go straight to a bakery.
There we bought a couple of Neapolitans and a croissant, all this for 2.70 euros.
While we return to the Pont Vieux, we are tasting our impromptu breakfast.
Once at our panoramic point, we took out the tripod and made the photos of rigor that we have in mind since we saw La Cité yesterday.
About 11.30 in the morning, we set off for Lagrasse, another point of our Journey through the Cathar Castles, a town where we want to see an abbey that we have read that is very beautiful.
We arrived in 30 minutes and parked in the parking lot indicated for visitors, but before heading to the abbey, we stopped at a cafeteria for coffee.
This gives us the necessary strength to start traveling the recommended itinerary in some information panels.
In this itinerary we go through the town, through the most important streets and despite the cold weather, we feel a kind of heat in the streets of this town.
Lagrasse
We cross the bridge and see the abbey in the distance, we are gradually approaching the panoramic point, where we rest for a while and have spectacular views.
The town is small, so it does not take us long to visit it and around 12 and something is already in the parking lot, to go to the last destination of our weekend getaway: Fontfroide Abbey.
We arrived around 1 noon and we are surprised that we do not see her all the way.
The GPS tells us that we are less than 300 meters away and we still can't see it. Then they would tell us that the Abbeys built them between mountains, so that they were not seen.
We park and see that there is a mandatory guided tour and that the first one starts at 2 in the afternoon.
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Since we had breakfast late, we think we can wait to eat and make that first visit in the afternoon.
Waiting for the time to come, we surround Fontfroide Abbey Without seeing it in all that time, only at the end of the road can we intuit the profile.
We have 20 minutes left for the visit to begin and we will get the entrance tickets.
They charge us 9 euros per person (enter the passport discount) and since the visit is in French, they give us an audio guide.
At 2 in the afternoon, with a little delay, we begin the visit.
Fontfroide Abbey
We go through all the rooms of Fontfroide Abbey and we started to see the profile we wanted to see so much.
We are impressed by the cloister, full of spectacular corners and that causes endless shots in our cameras.
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The visit lasts a total of an hour and a half. The truth is that it becomes a bit heavy, since the comments of the audio guide are much faster than those of the guide, so we have many moments that we spend walking around.
When we leave it is almost 4 in the afternoon. Let's go to the parking lot of Fontfroide Abbey and even without eating, we decided that it is time to get on our way home and we think that it is best to stop on the highway to eat something.
In the end we see a service area with a couple of fast food sites: error !!! we stopped!!!
And the worst mistake, we stopped at a "fast-paced" fried chicken restaurant "one that has a Chinese with a mustache ... and that starts with" K ".
I don't know if we leave there with more hunger than we had before entering !!
The fault has been mine. I had never entered this site and had been saying for some time that we had to go one day and notice that today was the day!
Of course ... we are very clear that we will not return !!
After this “fantastic” meal, we set off again and it took us about 2 hours to get home.
On the way back from this journey through the Cathar castles We are thinking of returning ... we have still many places to visit ...
Now we have to prepare for 2 weeks, we have another getaway ready. The 4 days of Holy Week arrive !!
