Local Time: July 15, 2014
It’s time to open up again. Not good not good….
Continued from last time. We rented a second car at the Toulouse train station. After that, we added a driver to each of them, so we were going to leave Toulouse with an automatic car that my father rented on the first day and a manual car that I rented on this day.
The places we plan to visit on this day are Moissac and Montpellier. We have booked a hotel in Montpellier for this evening.
はじめにトゥールーズから北に1時間ほど言ったところにある「モワサック」へと向かうことにしました。
If it’s usual here, it’s just like “we arrive before you know it”, but this time it’s not so easy. Yes, it’s because we have to go there with two cars.
We drove to Moissac with the first car (junior team car) driven by me in front and the second car (senior team car) driven by my father behind.
Fortunately, Moissac is easy to get to even with a paper map if you can get on the highway, so you should have plenty of time if you don’t stray from the highway from Toulouse city to the suburbs.
Just as I was thinking that, I suddenly got separated at a traffic light change (laughs).
However, since there were four of us in each car this time, and my wife in the passenger seat of the junior team car and my wife’s father in the passenger seat of the senior team car were able to contact each other by phone, we were able to meet up with each other safely while driving on the highway mud. We were able to get off at the nearest IC of Moissac at the same time and arrived at the town of Moissac at almost the same time as planned.
You can merge on the highway better than you think.
Now, Moissac, which I visited with two cars, is a place I chose because I really wanted to visit. I’ve passed by the town many times because there are many beautiful villages around here, but this is the first time I actually visited there.
モワサックは、世界遺産にも認定されている「フランスのサンティアゴ・デ・コンポステーラの巡礼路」における「ル・ピュイの道」で通過する街。
ル・ピュイの道といえば、最もポピュラーな巡礼路の一つだと思います。そしてフランスの最も美しい村好きには、一番おなじみの道とも言えます。なぜならば、「エスタン」「コンク」「ローゼルト」「オーヴィラール」といった村がそのルート上に位置しているからです。
It’s a road that I’ve passed through on my way to visit beautiful villages. So the town of Moissac has been burned into my mind without knowing it.
Various preliminaries have become long, but I was able to find a parking lot for two cars in the town safely, it is the start of sightseeing immediately.
Even though it is called sightseeing, the only place to see is “Saint Pierre Abbey” in the center of the city.
街の中心は、まさにこの地方でよく見かける「バスティード」形式、、といってよいのかな？？
In any case, it has a familiar and somewhat nostalgic atmosphere for the beautiful village traveler.
そして中央にそびえ立つサンピエール修道院へ。ここは、世界遺産「フランスのサンティアゴ・デ・コンポステーラの巡礼路」にも登録されている建物の一つ。
It is quite a large and magnificent cathedral.
By the way, “Registered?” means that this “pilgrimage route of Santiago de Compostela in France” is a kind of complex heritage, and some sections of the pilgrimage route and major historical buildings on the way of the pilgrimage route are a component group of this World Heritage.
In this Moissac, the “abbatiale Saint-Pierre et cloître” (abbey church and cloister) is registered.
First we toured inside the cathedral. This is free of charge.
After that, we visited the cloister in this monastery. There was a charge here.
To get to the cloister, you need to buy a ticket in the city information center behind the cathedral and enter from inside the building. The picture below shows the area right next to the cathedral, and on the right is the city information center.
The pamphlet I got when I bought a ticket to the cloister had the “UNESCO World Heritage” symbol printed on it.
Now, this corridor, as expected from the extra charge (huh?), was very beautiful. It was very beautiful.
Over the last 10 years or so, I’ve been to churches and cathedrals all over Europe. Of course, I have visited Romanesque cloisters like this one. I think this cloister in Moissac is one of the most beautiful.
By the way, it is difficult to take a picture of the corridor.
I wonder if the pilgrims since the Middle Ages also saw this cloister when they stopped by Moissac. I guess this beauty is unchanged though the time has passed and changed.
ところで、モワサックは、「ローゼルト」「オーヴィラール」を結ぶ道のちょうど真ん中に位置しています。両方の村とも2013年春におとずれています。訪問順は逆でオーヴィラール、ローゼルトの順番でした。
I guess this is the reason why I was somewhat attached to Moissac.
It’s a small town, and the only thing to see is this St. Pierre Abbey and its cloister. Still, I had a wonderful time.
After admiring the monastery, we stopped for a while at the Tarn River which flows through the city. It was just about 1pm, I think.
Next, we will go to Montpellier, where we will stay for the night.
この回も長くなってしまいました。モンペリエ編はまた別途書きます。（続く）
