On the road (Europe 2010): Millau, Roquefort, Lacaune, Gabian

Yesterday spent the day driving in the very beautiful hilly area just north of where we are staying (Pouzolles). First stop was the famous bridge at Millau, about an hour north on the freeway. The bridge, opened in late 2004, is the highest in the world. It has the highest towers and the highest road deck. The tallest tower is higher than the Eiffel Tower (as everything you read is fond of pointing out) and nearly as tall as the Empire State Building. The bridge was designed by Michel Virlogeux and Norman Foster. It is also the longest cable-stayed bridge in the world. It spans the valley of the River Tarn.

About half an hour to the southwest is the town of Roquefort-sur-Soulzon, the famous cheese town. Funny what you can learn about things when you visit the place they come from. After two cave tours (with tastings) I came away knowing that the Roquefort appellation is one of the smallest in France. Only cheese matured in caves near the town (mostly under the town, it seems) in an area 1.2 kilometers long, 300 meters wide, and 300 meters deep can be called Roquefort. The Penicillium roqueforti mold (yes, related to the penicillin mold) is introduced into the milk to insure uniform distribution. I had thought it was introduced later, but it turns out the holes you see in the cheese (not the naturally formed ones between the chunks of curd, but the skinny man-made ones) are to introduce air, not the mold, which is grown on rye bread (80% rye, 20% wheat) from which spores are collected.

The caves were downright cold--bring warm clothing. It was interesting to see the fleurines, the underground air passages that move cool air through the network of caves that formed here about 200 million years ago, when an entire mountain (the Combalou) collapsed, leaving a huge pile of rock riddled with holes. Air moving underground through the tunnels and caves is used to maintain the temperatures required to mature the cheese. The tours were a bit disappointing actually, as you can't see any of the activities that lead up to the formation of the "loaves" of cheese (just the maturation caves), but it was interesting nevertheless. The best advertised tour is at Société. It costs €3.5 a person, but the free tour at Papillon was as informative and shorter, without the various multi-media sections of the Société tour--which was a good thing. Having said that, I preferred the cheese at Société for its exceptionally creamy texture, and one fancy section of the tour does show clearly how the caves formed using a large animated model. Both tours were in French only, but detailed explanations are provided in print in English and a number of other languages.

Drove home by way of narrow mountain roads, passing through such towns as Lacaune, Olargues, and Gabian. The roads here are beautiful--mostly the D33, D607, D907, D14, D908, D909, and D13, with many vista points overlooking deep, wooded valleys, and (as you head east and south into the lower elevations) vineyards. In the town of Lacaune (officially Lacaune-les-Bains), many of the houses have old-fashioned slate tile roofs, most made from obviously hand-cut slate. But not only are many of the roofs covered with slate, many buildings had whole walls black with slate siding--which I've never seen before. Some of the wines of the area are known for the schist-rich soils the grapes grow in. I imagine slate is easily mined in the area too. The tiles are held on with little iron hooks. Do the black tiles keep the houses cool?

Lacaune had an amusing fountain, with four men pissing. There was a plaque mounted below calling it one of the fountains on the "pissing fountain circuit," so there must be more pissing fountains in other towns nearby, but the plaque neglected to say where. According to the plaque, the fountain dates to the 16th century. Next to the fountain was a large granite basin divided into sections that appears to have been used by the people of the village to wash their clothes when this was probably their main source of water. The water is potable. All this was in an attractive little square with a row of purple-leaved plum trees.

Further south and east, where the D14 crosses a summit called Col de Fontfroide, there is a somewhat puzzling memorial--puzzling mostly because my French was not good enough to understand everything it said. It's dedicated to the WWII resistance fighters of the area. That much was clear (perhaps they hid out in these hills?), but it included an urn of ashes from Auschwitz and a piece of barbed wire from Treblinka, and there were references to deportations during the war, but it wasn't really clear to me what the connection between the hilltop and the concentration camps was.

It was pretty countryside. The hills were covered mostly in conifers, heather (purple and pink in bloom), and a broom-like plant with vivid yellow-green, needle-like leaves. There was a dirt road leading along a stand of pine trees from the memorial up and over a hillock at the summit (marked 972 meters, or 3,189 feet). Walking along this road I heard many birds, but they mostly kept themselves hidden in the vegetation. The exception was a rather vocal fellow that called incessantly while flitting among the tops of the trees. He turned out to be a European Tree Pipit (Anthus trivialis), another new bird for me.

The drive back on the D908 and D909 through Faugères (a well-known wine town) and Gabian was just at sunset. The vineyards in the valleys surrounded by stark rock outcroppings were beautiful. The photo here was taken just outside of Gabian. A reader has pointed me to an excellent little Web site about Gabian (look for the British flag for English text).