We drove a few hours and arrived in Puy-de-Dôme, which is named after a dormant volcano. It is one of the original 83 departments created during the French Revolution on 4 March 1790. It was created from the former province of Languedoc. Puy-de-Dôme is part of the current region of Auvergne and is surrounded by the departments of Loire, Haute-Loire, Cantal, Corrèze, Allier, and Creuse.
This is a view from the window of our chambre d'hôtes. We stayed in a farm house that was run by a couple of police officers. They spent their holidays enjoying the area and running a bed and breakfast. We were hoping to see some amazing sights, like in these photos, but it rained and rained and the clouds were so low that visibility was horrible.
Think market was in Le Mont Dore, which is also a well known ski and spa town. It was freezing and raining. We bought the girls warm raincoats at this market. We also bought lots if sausage. When I asked the sausage seller if he would cut us a bit because we didn't have a knife, he went to his van and handed us a new, free knife. Score.
The weather was truly horrible, so we found this weirdness in Saint-Nectaire to keep us busy.
Since 1821 one family has been creating sculptures from the minerals in the (very hard) water that runs through this cave.
These plants take the iron out of the water so that the finished product is white. It seemed to be a very complicated and crazy process.
This is a mold making room.
Terrifying finished product
The molds are put on these ladders, where the water can run over them slowly depositing a film of minerals.
It stopped raining and we drove up the Saint-Nectaire. This church is a lovely example of Romanesque architecture in the region.
There are over 100 intricately carved capital stones and on some you can still see some of the original paintwork.
The church was pillaged during the Revolution, but it still holds
many relics.
many relics.
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