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The Dordogne

Périgord and Lot, France · France

The Dordogne valley has one of the highest concentrations of castles in France, and the reason is that the frontier ran through here during the Hundred Years' War: Beynac was French and Castelnaud, directly opposite across the river, was English. Around them, an intact medieval town, villages pressed against cliffs and, in a cave closed since 1963, paintings seventeen thousand years old.

4 days3 nights143 km8 stopsBest season: May to October, with the gardens open and the gabarres running. May, June and September are the best: the same green and far fewer people than in July and August, when the valley genuinely fills up. In winter many castles close or cut their hours.

Day 1The town nobody could knock down Day 2The Frenchman and the Englishman, face to face Day 3Box hedges and seventeen thousand years Day 4A village hanging off a wall

Day 1 · The town nobody could knock down

Sarlat and Domme · 24 km

Gilbert Bochenek — CC BY 3.0 (Wikimedia Commons)

Sarlat-la-Canéda

history

The capital of the Périgord Noir and one of the most complete medieval centres in France, with a density of listed buildings almost unmatched in the country. It survived because the town was economically stagnant for centuries and nobody had the money to knock anything down; in 1964 it became France's first protected sector under the Malraux law.

Tip

If you can, come on a Saturday morning: the market fills the square and the streets of the whole old town and is an institution in the region. And come back at night, when the streets are lit by gas lamps.

20 min to the next stop · 12 km

Ghezoart — CC BY-SA 3.0 (Wikimedia Commons)

Domme

history

A 13th-century bastide on a hilltop, with a terrace giving the finest panorama of the valley: the whole Dordogne winding more than a hundred metres below. You enter through the Porte des Tours, and on its walls are graffiti carved by the Templars held prisoner there after the Order was dissolved.

Tip

The Templar graffiti are seen on a guided visit only, not on your own: ask about times at the tourist office. And go to the belvedere at dusk, when the valley turns golden.

Day 2 · The Frenchman and the Englishman, face to face

Beynac, Castelnaud and La Roque-Gageac · 26 km

Gentil Hibou — CC BY-SA 3.0 (Wikimedia Commons)

Beynac-et-Cazenac

history

A castle on a hundred-and-fifty-metre cliff at a bend in the river, with the village spilling down the slope to the water. During the Hundred Years' War, Beynac was the French stronghold, and the castle you can see opposite, across the Dordogne, was the English one. They watched each other from their towers for decades.

Tip

Gabarres leave from the village, the flat-bottomed barges that carried goods downriver. The trip lasts an hour and is the best way to see both castles at once.

10 min to the next stop · 6 km

Chensiyuan — CC BY-SA 4.0 (Wikimedia Commons)

Castelnaud-la-Chapelle

history

The English castle, directly opposite Beynac. Today it houses a museum of medieval warfare and on the terrace stand full-size reconstructed siege engines: trebuchets, mangonels, a bombard. They work, and in season there are firing demonstrations.

Tip

By some distance the castle that works best with children on this route. And from the battlements you see Beynac head-on, which is what explains more than a century of war.

5 min to the next stop · 4 km

Manfred Heyde — CC BY-SA 3.0 (Wikimedia Commons)

La Roque-Gageac

heritage

A one-street village wedged between a cliff and the river, with the houses literally pressed against the rock face and some carved into it. It faces south and is sheltered from the wind, which is why it has an exotic garden with palms and banana plants in the middle of the Périgord.

Tip

In 1957 a rockfall from the cliff killed three residents and destroyed several houses, which is why parts below the cliff are fenced off today. Respect the barriers: they are not decorative.

Day 3 · Box hedges and seventeen thousand years

Marqueyssac and Lascaux · 38 km

MPhernambucq — CC BY-SA 3.0 (Wikimedia Commons)

The gardens of Marqueyssac

nature

Six kilometres of walks along a rocky spur, with a hundred and fifty thousand box plants hand-clipped into rounded shapes like clouds. From the belvedere at the far end you look out over the valley, with Beynac, Castelnaud, La Roque-Gageac and Domme all around.

Tip

Every box plant is clipped by hand, one by one, and it is months of work. Walk all the way to the belvedere at the end even if it looks far: it is what justifies the whole visit.

40 min to the next stop · 38 km

Renhour48 — CC0 (Wikimedia Commons)

Lascaux

history

In 1940 four teenagers and a dog found a cave with nearly two thousand figures painted seventeen thousand years ago. It opened to the public in 1948 and within barely fifteen years the breath and body heat of visitors began destroying the paintings: it closed in 1963 and has never reopened. What you visit is an exact replica.

Tip

That it is a copy takes nothing away: it is made to the millimetre and is the only way to see that. Buy tickets online, because visits run to fixed times and sell out in season.

Day 4 · A village hanging off a wall

Rocamadour · 55 km

Dynamosquito from France — CC BY-SA 2.0 (Wikimedia Commons)

Rocamadour

heritage

An entire village clinging to a vertical hundred-and-fifty-metre cliff, on three levels: the village below, the sanctuary in the middle and the castle above. It was one of the great pilgrimage destinations of medieval Europe, and pilgrims climbed the two hundred and sixteen steps of the Grand Escalier on their knees.

Tip

It is in the Lot department, already outside the Périgord, a little over an hour from Sarlat. Park below and go up by lift or on foot; the upper car park fills early in season.

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