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Yuck! It rained last night :-(
We knew it was going to but it's still disappointing when it does...... this
morning was overcast so we decided to go see Montpellier and see what that
was like BUT we thought we'd explore a little on the way! So we set the
TomTom on "Shortest route" setting and off we went. To be honest I ignored it
a little bit when we set off and went deliberately in the wrong direction (it
automatically recalculates your route for you if you've missed and exits of
something) we got to one of the winding mountain roads and as we reached the
top the TomTom said, in xx yards turn left, which was a rocky dirt track, so
we took it and drove at 20mph or so for a couple of miles out into the plain.
The land around us was all rocky outcrops, rought grass and very little
else..... eventually we came to a motorway and although there was a gap in
the armaco barrier (and a STOP sign) there was no slip road etc........ it
was a bit like some of the junctions onto the A1 but onto a bigger
motorway..... A couple of miles after that it instructed us to get off the
motorway and follow what was obviously the "old road" to Montpellier and it
was totally devoid of traffic which was fabulous because it means that
anything we wanted to randomly stop and look at we could without danger of
getting in anyone elses way. We had got to a small village whne the TomTom
said "turn left" again and this time it was up a narrow gravel track which
wound its way up the closest mountain over the top and down the other side
until we reached another metalled road some 9km later - great drive and
something we probably wouldn;t have done without the TomTom directing us!
Montpellier was ok, it has some beautiful architecture but it felt a
little....... well...... overcrowded and threatening. We stayed a couple of
hours and by that time we'd had enough and headed back to camp via the gravel
mountain roads again! We had been seeing signes for something to do with the
Knights Templar so we followed them for a while and found a small village
with a walled centre (literally 20 or 30 houses and a church) which was
apperently where the Templars were founded - the village is called Le
Chevalier and is about 8 miles South East of Millau. Very nice, although most
of it had been rebuilt in the 17th century and some of it a lot more recent
than that, they did have a nice little set up - again we have some photos to
post of the more interesting bits. The inside of the Church was very
different to anything I've aver seem before, it was all stone, very dark on
the inside with high vaulted ceilings and very small plain looking windows.
Nice though...... I guess there will be pictures of it on the internet if
you're interested and look hard enough :-) we didn't take any because it said
no visitors inside but we sneaked a peak anyway!
The weather still looks rough in south eastern France and Northern Italy so
We're not sure whether we'll hang on here a while or push onwards towards
Nice....... I'm sure you'll find out on a later Blog :-)
Bye for now.
Dale and Claire
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