For day two of our trip in the Dordogne region we branched out from Sarlat and went biking to a few small towns located along the Dordogne river. These included Beynac-et-Cazenac, Castelnaud la Chapelle, Domme and La Roque-Gageac. The bike route followed the river and was mostly flat, except on the way to the town of Domme which happens to be located at the top of a large hill. Each town was quite close together as well, so in total we only spent about an hour biking in each direction.
Beynac-et-Cazenac
Beynac is only about 10km from Sarlat and we started the trip there in the early in the morning when the forest was still coated in a dense dewey fog. We parked our car in a large parking lot next to the town and then took some time preparing our bikes and our dog for the journey ahead.
While I was pumping up our tires my wife called over to me and pointed down the road to where a large castle had just sort of materialized out of the quickly evaporating mist.
"Whoa! I didn't even see that when we pulled in."
The old town of Beynac is located at the top of a steep hill overlooking the river. The streets are cobblestones and it was a bit of a struggle to get our bikes down to the street. Neither of us are skilled enough to ride in those conditions and we definitely would have popped a tire if we had tried.
The plus side of walking our bikes down the hill though was that we got to explore the town at a more leisurely pace and take a few pictures before it got too busy.
The first thing that we saw in town was the 12th century castle, as I mentioned previously. It's located at the very top of the hill approximately 150 meters above the Dordogne.
There's an old stone wall up there along the cliff as well with a walking trail that takes you into the forest and along a few trails. From there you get some really great views of the river and the valley below.
They say that the best way to experience the Dordogne is by bike or by boat and as you can see in the next two photos, many people tend to opt for the latter.
There was a steady stream of dozens or possibly even hundreds of boats, canoes and kayaks making their way down the river throughout the day. You can rent them in nearly all of the towns that we visited.
As you may have guessed from the name, Beynac-et-Cazenac was once two distinct villages that were amalgamated together in 1827. I noticed a clear distinction between the two while we were exploring though I cannot say technically where one ends and the other begins. Basically, one of them is situated at the top of the hill while the other is located down by the river and then there are some residential homes between which makes them almost appear as one. I believe that Beynac is the one on top of the hill though because the castle is referred to as Chateau de Beynac.
Beynac appeared to be the older of the two villages and ultimately seemed to be a bit more touristy. It had a few gift shops and a restaurant or two but it was quite small overall. Still, it was very much worth checking out.
The steep road down to the river winds its way through a small residential community with some really quaint and charming houses in it.
I noticed that a few of the homes were being renovated, like the one above that appeared to be completely gutted on the inside. I would love to see what the interior of the homes looked like. It looks like this one is going to have an amazing view of the valley.
I really liked the little seating area nook on the outside of the next home. It looks like a nice spot to enjoy your morning coffee.
I really have a thing for homes like the next one - homes that have roads on both sides and create a fork. I don't know what you call them, they're not really an island but peninsula home just doesn't have the right ring to it.
After a fairly quick tour of Beynac we got on our bikes and headed over to Castelnaud.
Castelnaud la Chapelle
There is no dedicated bike trail along the river so the entire ride ended up being on the road, which always makes me a little nervous. Nearly all of the streets are narrow in France and they rarely ever have a shoulder, I'm just not a fan biking so close to passing vehicles.
There were quite a few other bikers on the road though and most drivers in the country are used to cyclists so they typically give you a lot of space when riding. We didn't have any problem during our ride that day.
Castelnaud is a lot like Beynac in that it's a small village with a castle in it that dates back to the 12th century. The town is also broken up in a similar way with the castle up on a hill with a few homes and shops surrounding it and than a larger village closer to the river with all of the restaurants and commercial amenities.
My understanding is that the castle was built to rival its neighbor (Beynac) across the river, which kind of makes me think that it's a historic example of a keeping up with the Jone's scenario.
We arrived in town after biking for less than 30 minutes and parked our bikes in large parking lot in the main part of town. Then we hiked up to the castle through a large green space and some winding residential roads. It was a bit of a hike to get up there and took about 20-30 minutes.
There were some shops at the top of the hill selling trinkets and other very touristy wears and maybe one or two restaurants, but not much else. You can enter the castle for a small fee but we weren't interested in doing so. According to their website the castle houses an armor and weapons museum as well as some pretty heavy duty seige machines, which would have been neat to see I'm sure. Unfortunately, the castle is behind a large gate though so you can't actually get a good view of it without paying admission. Needless to say, I don't have any pictures of it up close. There's probably a view up there of the valley, but you need to enter the castle to see that as well, so I didn't get any photos of it either. We basically turned right around and headed back to our bikes once we realized all that there was nothing to see up there. The homes and streets along the way were nice though.
My Takeaway
In comparing Beynac and Castelnaud I would say that we much preferred Beynac and in some ways Castelnaud felt a bit like a waste of time. Unlike Castelnaud, Beynac had a good view of the Chateau from many different angles and you could enter the courtyard and chapel without paying for admission. It also had a great view of the valley and the river and it was slightly larger and seemed to have more things to see and do. Out of the four villages that we saw that day we liked Castelnaud the least, so if you travel to the area and do not have time to see them all then I would say that you're best to just skip Castelnaud.