Friday, April 11th 2014: Carcassonne

Bonjour!

Yesterday I had the pleasure of taking my first european train ride from Gare de Limoux to Gare de Carcassonne. I left right after work so was able to spend the afternoon in La Cité. My real reason for going was to find out how the train works so that on Monday when I leave to the Toulouse Airport to get to Paris I wont get lost or take the wrong train. However, spending the afternoon in the old town of Carcassonne was a big bonus since I've been dying to get there since first arriving in Limoux. Carcassonne is a fascinating city and very close to where I currently live, only about 22km. It has a small airport (which I leave from to get to London on the 23rd of this month) and is made up of a "modern town" (last 400-500 years or so) and La Cité or the old town which is the fortified castle city, similar in many respects to Old Quebec if you've ever been, but of course much much older. La Cité de Carcassonne's first stone wall was laid in the first century AD. Over time the city was a major political edge in terms of war and defences. Throughout the middle ages the city began to grow and be developed right through the Cathar reigns in Southern France. After the Crusade which forced all the Albegensians out of their home. The city was even further fortified and eventually given to the King of France. It was throughout this time a second line of defences had been built including a moat and an outer wall. The city was so well defended it was considered impenetrable. Finally when Languedoc region was officially given to France and no longer split between Spain the city lost its militaristic and political edge and quickly was allowed to fall into decay. By the 1800s the "modern city" was growing and an Architect by the name of Le-Duc made it his life's work to restore La Comtal de Carcassonne. Most of the archives were lost in fires throughout the cities long history and so much of his work was based on old stories, a few paintings and much deductive reasoning based on his knowledge of the middle ages and of architecture. He chose to restore the Castle city after one time period that of the King of France Louis (one of the many, I forget which number) so it is safe to say the the city is not likely the perfect image of what it once was but more modern science now suggests Le-Duc was very close. Much of the city will always remain a mystery to archeologist and historians. It is an amazing site and I recommend it to any one in the area, I am told one must also spend time in the "Modern City" which I have yet to do. Comtal is very touristy but early April makes for a really good time to go as the weather is nice but there aren't too many vacationers yet, mostly just children's school groups.

These slits in the wall were for the archers to shoot arrows out of this one is on the outer wall

This is the gate to the Comtal

Originally this was a bridge over a moat for addd defences today the moat is drained and the bridge is fixed but originally it was actually a timber draw bridge.

Those wooden shelters were actually pathways for the archers to protect the Comtal from

This is the smaller court yard

This church is actually in the place where another line of defences once stood but Le-Duc decided that it was more important for Carcassonne to have another church then to restore the final part of the castle and so he designed this.

Another view of the smaller courtyard

This is one of the many "Murder Holes" in the towers along the wall during an attack it would have been used to hurl objects down at invaders. Usually rocks and not hot oil as most people might think as oil was to expensive to use that way.