Au Revoir Du-Foix

Randi and I surprised ourselves and headed back out exploring Sunday, Oct 11th, the day after Dan and Janet left us. The whole time there we seemed to talk about them and the time we had together. We thought that they were probably glad to be back home and out of our bread crumb and cheese powered Peugeot 308.

We took a short, one hour ride to the town of Foix. There we visited Le Chateau De Foix. It was built around 1000, in a strategic location, on top of a large piece of rock. It sits up high, overlooking the small town of Foix.

We enjoyed learning about the story of the famous Gaston Fébus ...the Lord of the Pyrenees ...the Count of Foix ...the King of the Pyrenees ...Gastronomy Gaston ...Kill em all Gaston ...Febus the Fecal. I made up the last few but he had a lot of good names.

The reign of Gaston III was one of the rare success stories of the destructive fourteenth century. By playing a skillful game of shifting allegiances, he avoided being drawn into the conflicts between his more powerful neighbors, thus sparing his domains the devastations of warfare. Best known as a patron of the arts, and the author of a celebrated 'Book of the Hunt' (a good simple book title). Here he is supposedly teaching his minions how to hunt. He has a long stick in his hand and they have scrolls of writing paper. He's most likely teaching them that it's not the size of the weapon that counts, it's the technique used.

Ran and I then went on a 10 minute ride outside of Foix to find Le Pont du Diable bridge or the Devil's bridge. It was a unique looking bridge built across a small river that reminded me of one of the rivers on the North Shore, that feeds into Lake Superior. We sat on a large rock on the bank of the river, looking up at the bridge and the scenery around us.
It was a beautiful day. We sat there and had a bottle of wine and counted our blessings. In the pic I'm showing off my new handy pocket knife with corkscrew. Gaston 'The Great' would be proud of me.