Château de Duras
The Château de Duras was built during the Middle Ages to defend the Dropt Valley. Initially an invincible citadel, it went through many transformations over the following centuries which would give it an aristocratic-villa-style character and its vocation as an 18th-century leisure castle.
Duras is the town of Dukes and scholars and it left its mark on a certain Marguerite Donnadieu who chose the penname Duras to sign her books.
Impressive Gavaudun
The Château de Gavaudun, a medieval fortress built on a rocky outcrop, is a battleship located on the border between Périgord and L'Agenais. The site was already one of military ingenuity, the talent of the builders of the Middle Ages had provided it with its proud warrior qualities.
In spite of its location and despite its architecture reputed as invincible thanks to its entrance which was impossible for cavalrymen to storm, Gavaudun actually fell. Its dungeon, however, continues to impress to this day.
In Nérac, a king’s castle
Few castles in Lot-et-Garonne can boast of having belonged to a king. The Château de Nérac can however stake a claim to this. The Château de Nérac, built by the d’Albret family on the foundations of a former Gascon fort, overlooks the Baïse River.
Its most illustrious inhabitant was, without any doubt, Henry IV, King of France and of Navarre. Today, only the North wing of the castle remains standing as a testimony to this magnificent period when the d’Albret family reigned over France.
The quill and the sword, Château de Montluc
©Wikipedia
A medieval castle sits supreme in Estillac and owes its renown to one of its owners who played a role in the history of France. Its first stones were laid during the 13th century but it was Blaise de Montluc, Marshal of France and author of Commentaires, who was to give it its current-day features. It was here that the author drafted his written commentary which would make him famous.
The castle is built in a highly-defensive trapezoid shape and sits majestically on its hill dominating the Garonne Valley. Its triangular-shaped inner courtyard houses Blaise de Montluc’s chair and his mausoleum.
Tel: +33 (0)5 53 66 14 14
www.tourisme-lotetgaronne.com
Madaillan, witness of the Hundred Years’ War
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The Hundred Years’ War began in Saint-Sardos, twenty kilometres from the Château de Madaillan which was already used as a lookout over the Bourbon Valley, from its position in the Agenais Pays de Serres (“Serres” means landscape with long, narrow ridged plateaus). It resisted the Wars of Religion but was not left unscathed by time and it is due to the passion of its current owners that the Château de Madaillan has regained its former splendour.
When warlike and residential architecture unite harmoniously.
Tel: +33 (0)5 53 66 14 14
www.tourisme-lotetgaronne.com
It goes without saying that this tried-and-true globetrotter’s passport is never far away. Laurent Cluchier tots up the marathons, but when he's back home in the Southwest he spends most of his time running after articles to write, after two 4,5cl of coffee, to be precise…..