Holiday: Figeac

I've finally got round to editing some more of my photos from my holiday in France so here we go.

We went into Figeac twice; once on the Friday to get Suzanne a change of clothes and again on the Saturday for the market and a proper look around.

Figeac is a fairly substantial town in the Lot Departement of the Mid-Pyrenees, so quite Mediterranean in many ways. It's sited on the River Célé and has a large number of old houses and other building that date back to the 13th to 16th centuries when it was an important trade centre plus a large market that is held every Saturday and which is extremely popular.

The market covers the main square and many of the little roads that branch off from there.  The stalls are amazing - lots of fruit, veg, cheese and olive based stalls with produce that looked of incredibly good standard.  I've never seen so many varieties of tomatoes all together in one place and if we'd been self-catering, I'd have bought plenty.  I just took a few photos of the market because there were so many people around.

I was sorely tempted, but the thought of trying to get it home unbroken was just too daunting.  Maybe I could have a go in pottery class?

We had lunch at a roadside cafe where some market stalls had been earlier.  We each had a croque monsieur, a beer and then a mini-coffee and it came to €14 which I thought was pretty good.

Suzanne checking her phone!

We had a good wander around.  

The 'Museum of Ecriture' in Figeac, in a modern redesign of a medieval building on Place Champollion, is a very interesting, and looks at writing across the centuries, including an explanation of how the writing on the Rosetta Stone was decoded. The museum is based in Figeac because it was the birth place of Francois Champollion, renowned for his work in deciphering Egyptian hieroglyphics - the museum is based in the house where he was born.

We didn't visit the museum but we did go down an alleyway to the side to the Place des Ecritures where there's a room sized model of the Rosetta stone set in a pretty courtyard.  Very impressive it was too.

We visited the second church in Figeac, the Church of Notre-Dame-de-Puy (Our Lady of Puy) which is set high up on a hill with fabulous views over Figeac.  It is very ornate, very colourful and yet has a peaceful feeling at the same time.

Outside the church, there's a stone 'map' showing the view over Figeac and naming some of the buildings and places.  

I took various other shots of interesting little buildings, etc.  I loved the narrow alleyways with towering stone houses on both sides and the rooftop open galleries/balconies which were a feature of many buildings.

There were lots of very old, 'stoned up' window and doorway arches.  We wondered if they were closed up for tax purposes.  Does anyone know?

I really loved Figeac.  It was so old, so interesting, had such a great vibe to it and that market was . . .  well, I just wish we had something similar round here.  We even got free parking for just a five minute walk into the centre.

Well worth a visit if you ever find yourself in southern-central France.