{"id":33650,"date":"2023-07-22T04:33:56","date_gmt":"2023-07-21T18:33:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/michaelandpamstravels.com\/?p=33650"},"modified":"2024-01-01T07:09:13","modified_gmt":"2023-12-31T20:09:13","slug":"espalion-france-%f0%9f%87%ab%f0%9f%87%b7-2023","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/michaelandpamstravels.com\/?p=33650","title":{"rendered":"Espalion, France \ud83c\uddeb\ud83c\uddf7 2023"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Date: 20th July 2023<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Travelled: 60 kms from Conques to Espalion  <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Visited: Estaing and Espalion  <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Stayed: Camping de Roc L\u2019Arche, \u20ac17, N44.52230, E02.76940  <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Budget: 59 days @ \u20ac87 per day<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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We\u2019ve had a late breakfast and it\u2019s time for the road once again. I set the GPS for Estaing another village on our list. The road looks like a goat track, so I check Google Maps and it looks like the goat track it is.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The road is narrow as it winds its way up and down the hills and valleys. Fortunately we only pass 4-5 cars in the hour it takes to reach Estaing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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From our guide book the Most Beautiful Villages of France you\u2019ll find Estaing on page 194. Estaing stands on the River Lot, its castle overlooks the village and its magnificent 5 arch stone bridge. The Estaing family was synonymous with wealth and political influence in France from the 13th century for 300 years. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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We cross the River Lot over this lovely old single lane Bridge, finding ourselves a spot with a few other motorhomes. The photo below shows a beautiful view of Estaing from our car-park.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Another view of the Pont<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Worth a photo<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Walking up the Main Street, Rue Fran\u00e7ois d\u2019Estaing<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Eventually we find the \u00c9glise Saint-Fleuret circa 15th century. Saint Fleuret is the patron saint of Estaing. The church is lovely but difficult to photograph from street level.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Looking along the Nave to the Alter<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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As we leave the church, the bells toll mid-day as we walk 50m further up the hill to find the castle is closed from 12-2pm. A little frustrating but we should know by now nothing happens in France between 12 and 2 !<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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It\u2019s a hot afternoon and the thought of sitting in the Hymer in the sun for 90 minutes doesn\u2019t appeal to us. As there\u2019s no aire CC or campsite in Estaing we continue on another 10 kms to Espalion via a supermarket.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Espalion isn\u2019t in our guide book of beautiful French Villages and doesn\u2019t rate a mention in our Rough Guide (circa 2012), but it has a nice campsite, with plenty of shade on a hot afternoon, unfortunately it\u2019s run by a nasty old lady but that\u2019s a story for another day.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The town stands on the River Lot about 25 klm north of Rodez which is the largest city in the area, Google and Wiki show no interest so I haven\u2019t added a link.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The old town and pont are quite picturesque as a backdrop to the Lot.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Catching our breath as we walk the river into the old town<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Skittles are big in Espalion, did I mention I was the Malaysian Champion at skittles<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Standing on the Pont Roman (pictured above) we start chatting to Alison from Victoria of all places. After exchanging some colloquial barbs, she\u2019s explains she\u2019s walking the French Camino to Santiago de Compostela, 14 days into 46 day walk.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dinner is mushroom and ham quiche from a little Boulangerie in Conques, it was better than good. We turn the AC on for a couple of hours before a cool change sweeps through just after mid-night. The forecast is a much cooler day tomorrow.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Michael + Pam<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Date: 20th July 2023 Travelled: 60 kms from Conques to Espalion   Visited: Estaing and Espalion   Stayed: Camping de Roc L\u2019Arche, \u20ac17, N44.52230, E02.76940   Budget: 59 days @ \u20ac87 per day We\u2019ve had a late breakfast and it\u2019s time for the road once again. I set the GPS for Estaing another village on our list. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":33674,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[72],"class_list":{"0":"post-33650","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-france","8":"tag-french-villages","9":"czr-hentry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/michaelandpamstravels.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33650","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/michaelandpamstravels.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/michaelandpamstravels.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michaelandpamstravels.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michaelandpamstravels.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=33650"}],"version-history":[{"count":15,"href":"https:\/\/michaelandpamstravels.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33650\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":35241,"href":"https:\/\/michaelandpamstravels.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33650\/revisions\/35241"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michaelandpamstravels.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/33674"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/michaelandpamstravels.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=33650"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michaelandpamstravels.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=33650"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michaelandpamstravels.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=33650"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}