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Short visit to the Cantal



You might know the Volvic mineral water, right? Did you know where does it come from?
From the Massif Central (FR), its source is Clairvic Spring in the Auvergne Regional Park.

So if you can imagine this bottle of water- most importantly, the logo of the brand – imagine it in a bigger version and you’ve arrived! The landscape is green, incredibly green. However, there’s not many trees, just the grassy plateaus.


We spent a weekend in Cantal, that lies in the middle of France's central plateau. More precisely, we stayed next to Puy Mary, an extinct volcano, about 6,5 million years old.

The snow covered Puy Mary

Our plans meet the reality
As we spent the 1st of May Bank Holiday there, we prepared with hiking boots and lots of motivation to climb the mountains. Unfortunately this winter was longer than usually, and the weekend brought terrible weather circumstances.

Positive experience
  •         Luckily we found a nice, old gîte for our stay, in Lavigerie.
    • Gîte  >a furnished holiday house in France, typically in a rural district<
  •        It was located in the middle of nowhere, as we like non-touristy places. There were more dogs in the village, than inhabitants.
  •         Culture schock in France. The village seemed to be back in time, with its architectural style, running chickens all over and free dogs on the streets.
  •         And finally plenty of artisan products (chicken, eggs, ham, cheese, beer, honey, just to list a few of them.)

Lavigerie, the village under Puy Mary

5 mins walk from Lavigerie

The bitter pill
  •  The village was authentic, and still as tourists we had to pay overprice by the local artisans.
  •  No one to blame, but it was rainy, stormy, even snowy. The roads that led to the national       hikes were closed.
Our program
  •          Discovering the landscape and the artisan products, local gastronomy. We found some  extremely delicious ham, cheese (Cantal, Saint-Nectaire, Salers, and the Bleu) and honey.
  •         Pleasant visits to two historical cities: Saint Flour and Murat
  •         Early morning Monday hike
Saint Flour
Murat

Monday and early morning together makes a hike unforgettable

According to the weather forecast these were the few dry hours of the sassy weather. As we didn’t want to risk too much, we selected an easy hike, around the Col de Serre.

The landscape was stunning: grassy plateaus and fresh springs, rocks in the most surprisingly shape at the strangest locations. It gave a ’The Lord of the Rings’ feeling.
The peak was slightly snowy, here the temperature suddenly dropped. It was surprising to realise that, even though it was in Spring, there were more snow after our stay, than when we arrived!


Strange fact
During our morning hike, we heard a lound buzing noise above us. We were puzzled and looked all around, only to find a drone. It was loudly flying all around the mountain range, and stopping from time to time. Any ideas why?

View during our hike
Lucky 
As the morning was quiet, we saw a herd of deer crossing the snow covered mountains. So satisfying and magical to know that up to this day, in the middle of France, you can still find wild animals!


Travel with dog 🐶
In the village: all the dogs of the village are free to leave their gardens. These are friendly shepherd dogs. If yours is well socialized, there shouldn’t be any problems.

One of the neighbour dogs said Hello to us

Hikes: the hikes we did were easy and intermediate level. Achievable even for a (fit) bichon. As the weather was more wintery than expected, we found him to be a bit cold when we reached the first snowy parts.
Cold-dog

 Historical sites: Not possible in castels or museums, but OK in restaurants.


Note
We couldn’t discover as much as we wanted to. The region is full of hidden gems, beautiful landscapes, and heritages, it is definetely worth to visit and even more to return!

See the map below, for the route of our two short hikes. We would have gladly walked until the top of Puy Mary, due to the snow we had to turn back between Col de Serre and Pas de Peyrol.

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