The Grotto

Friday, July 24, 2014

     One of the things I find most enjoyable about living in Caunes-Minervois is that I am always discovering new paths to walk and take in.  Yesterday Matthew and I took Beau out on a walk that began with our walking down Côte de Montplaisir, a street a few feet from my door that slopes down towards Avenue de l'Abbaye.  Avenue de l'Abbaye, as its name indicates, leads to the Benedictine Abbey that has stood in Caunes since the Middle Ages.  The road on the other side of its beginning is just a country path Beau and I had walked many times: or so I thought.

     The gradient of the land slopes downward, almost imperceptibly, with farmland on the left and two estates on the right.  At one point the path narrows and it seems the only way to go further is to walk through the fields.  I had always turned back at this point, believing I had gone as far as I could without trespassing on private property.  This evening though, Matthew and I decided to take that path to see where it ended.

     And it was a revelation: the path, which had been just gravel and dirt, became paved, evidently with cars in mind.  The rows of vines, thickly planted on flat land, gave way to fruit trees, and then, on each side, to two large tracts of land above which a higher road, planted with large, bushy trees, towered.  I heard a car behind me and turned: it was the "Police Municipale" patrolling the road.  The policeman, Nicolas, cheerily engaged me in conversation and explained that the road lead to an underpass on the route to a bridge that had been wiped out by floods a few years ago.  When the bridge functioned, it allowed vehicles to cross from the road to Trausse on the east side of Caunes' village limits to the west, the road to Carcassonne, without having to drive through the village.  The bridge is supposed to be repaired, but when that will happen, no one knows, Nicolas concluded before continuing his patrol.

     I walked another 300 yards or so and came upon not just the fallen bridge, but a grotto below the bridge and to the side.  An older couple were watching the stream of water trickling beneath the grotto's rocks as well as keeping an eye on their dog, a black and white shepherd named "Amy".  The man had an unlit, hand-rolled cigarette in his mouth, which seemed to have been there a long time.  "Yes, the flood destroyed the bridge", the man said in response to my question.  "About three or four years ago."  He raised his arm as high as possible in the direction of the tree next to which he was standing.  "The water was as high as that", he said, pointing to the top of the tree.

     The underpass of the bridge was a bit further on the path to the left of the grotto.  It was intact, so Matthew, Beau and I walked through it towards a path which led us to the high road on which I had seen the thickly-leaved trees.  The road sloped upward and past a gorgeous house with exquisite formal gardens, an enormous pergola under which a very large dining table and chairs had been arranged, to the left of which was a lovely swimming pool.  We would never have seen the house from the road leading out of  Porte de Narbonne towards Trausse: it was nestled, far from prying eyes, in the slope of the land.

     Reaching the top of the slope and turning left, we found ourselves on the highland, looking down at the fields whose edges we had traversed earlier.  We were high enough to see farms in the far distance, as well as La Montagne Noir and the faint outlines of the Pyrenées, still visible as dusk fell.

     It was a longer walk home than I had originally anticipated, but I would not have missed it for the world.