… where I was last night when the report of the daily activities never made it to the world.
The answer is that I was crashed out here on the sofa. I dozed off in the middle of the Panthers v Redskins gridiron game and that was that until about 02:00 in the morning.
Having lived for so long in splendid rural isolation, I can’t come to terms with modern urban living. Traffic all through the night, people moving about at 06:00, dogs barking, horns blowing.
No, it’s no good for me. I had almost no sleep in my little room.
24 hours ago though, I was some where completely different.
I was sitting up on the car park at the panoramic viewpoint just outside Clermont-Ferrand on the D941.
I’d bought a pot of jam and some orange juice yesterday, this morning I’d picked up half a baguette, and here I stopped for breakfast.
This is one of the best places in the whole of the Puy-de-Dome to come and admire the view, even when it’s raining.
It’s certainly a class above almost everywhere else (the St Lawrence River excluded, of course) where I’ve stopped for breakfast when I’ve been on the road
And I wasn’t alone here either because several other people had come to join in the proceedings
We’ve been to the cathedral of Notre-Dame de l’Assomption – Our Lady of the Assumption – in Clermont Ferrand on many occasions as regular readers of this rubbish will recall.
Unfortunately though, we’ve never been able to take a really good photograph of it because it’s all hemmed in by buildings.
No such difficulties from up here though, is there? Especially with a 300mm zoom lens
And when I crop the photograph and blow it up, because I can do that despite modern terrorism legislation, I can produce something magnificent because the building really is superb
It’s the third cathedral on the site. The original one was built in the 5th Century and was destroyed by Pepin le Bref in 760 and again by the Normans in 915 – this time rather more permanently.
Its replacement wasn’t considered grand enough in the period of the magnificent church-building programmes of the 12th and 13th Centuries, and so construction of the present one was commenced in 1248.
Clearly built by the local council, the final (for now) stone of black pierre de Volvic was laid more than 650 years later, in 1905.
But it’s the second cathedral that is the most famous. There on the steps on 27th November 1095, Pope Urban II made the call for the First Crusade to the Holy Land, and laid the foundations for much of what has gone wrong in the world ever since.
Regular readers of this rubbish – albeit in one of its previous incarnations – will recall the view in that photograph.
That’s the Plateau de Gergovie and Liz and I, on one of our fact-finding missions, went to sit on the top of the hill and have lunch.
That’s said by many, including Napoleon III, to be the site where the Gaullish leader Vercingetorix inflicted upon Julius Caesar the first major defeat that he suffered.
Having breakfasted and … errr … relaxed for a short while, I headed off down the D941 in the direction of the historic village of Miremont.
The claim to fame of Miremont is the church of St Bonnet situated on top of an isolated rock on the edge of the village.
This is another one of those places that has been high on my list of places to visit, and following the football club about is certainly enabling me to see the sights
It dates from the middle of the 12th century, although I would have given it perhaps 50 years more.
But never mind the church for a moment, jut look at the site that it has.
It’s situated on a pinnacle of rock overlooking the confluence of the rivers Sioulet and Chevalet, – an ideal defensive position for any nobleman bent on increasing his power in the region
And as we know, some of these noblemen were as bent as they come.
We’re lucky in that the church was built in such a place.
As peace descended onto the area in the years before the horrors of the Hundred Years War, the inhabitants left the safety of the tops of the inaccessible hills and into the more accessible and more fertile valleys.
Consequently this church escaped the rush of church “modernisations” and “rebuilding” in the 13th Century following the return of the Crusaders with the wealth that they had pillaged from Constantinople and the Holy Land.
Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that I have a pet theory about early churches in rural France.
I’ve said before … "and on many occasions too" – ed … that I reckon that they started life as chapels to fortresses built in easily-defensible positions.
As the importance of the fortress declined in the era of peace, the importance of the church increased and gradually took over the site.
We are very fortunate here in that with this site being so inaccessible, it was never pillaged as ruthlessly for building stone when it was abandoned, as many other sites have been.
And so a good prowl around in the undergrowth produces very clear evidence that there was some kind of fortification up here.
This looks very much like the remains of one of these four-cornered fortified chateaux to me, the type that the Knights Templar loved to take over for their Commanderies.
As for the football, which is why we are here after all, it was a triumph for the FC Pionsat St Hilaire 2nd XI.
They’ve had some really bad luck in matches since the start of the season and at one time not so long ago they were hopelessly adrift at the foot of the table.
However a good win last Saturday night against the Goatslayers buoyed up their spirits.
Today though, for the first time in a couple of years, they played like a team with belief.
This was mainly down to Emeric who played today, being unavailable for the 1st XI last night. He drove the team on relentlessly from midfield.
And special mention must go to Kevin, who volunteered to play in goal and had an excellent game.
Vincent has come into the senior side from the juniors this season.
He has a lot to learn of course, but being coached from the crowd on the touchline, he managed to score his debut goal for the team – the first of many, we hope.
The tean finished by winning convincingly, 3-1, to move up to fourth from bottom.
And despite all of the criticism that I have given to the defence, the back four played magnificently. If only they could play like this in every match they would have no worries at all.
It’s a shame about the driving rain though – it put a dampener on the proceedings though.
And so, having had a nice weekend away from home, which surely does me good, I headed off back for my pizza and garlic bread.
I deserved them.
