Les Eyzies

Friday, June 12, 2015
Les Eyzies-de-Tayac, Aquitaine, France
 I was determined to see Font de Gaum - but you had to queue to get tickets (apparently some were available online, but I couldn't find them). It was a 20 minute walk and we arrived at 8.15 a.m. Ticket sales started at 9.30 and we were about 28th in line. We missed the English speaking tours but got into a French one at 10.45. A 45 minute tour. Only 13 per group and no bags - you can't touch the walls for preservation reasons. There is a man made floor, but very narrow and in some places not very high. All genuine - none of the replica stuff here!

"Grotte de Font de Gaume, listed as World Heritage with UNESCO since 1979, is located on the outskirts of Les Eyzies in the direction of Sarlat . Font de Gaume, a prehistoric cave, is one of the most incredible Palaeolithic sites in the world still open to the public. It reveals more than two hundred painted or engraved representations of bison, horses, mammoths and reindeer, of which many are polychrome."

"Cro-Magnon is the informal word once used by scientists to refer to the people who were living alongside Neanderthals at the end of the last ice age (ca. 35,000-10,000 years ago). They were given the name 'Cro-Magnon' because in 1868, parts of five skeletons were discovered in the
rockshelter of that name, located in the famous Dordogne Valley of France."  The Abri de Cro Magnon was just over the road from us. Les Eyzies is actually on the Vezere River - The Vézère is a 211 km long river in southwestern France. It is an important tributary to the Dordogne River.

We walked over to see the old church-fortress at Tayac - about a 15 minute walk from our B & B. In fact, if we'd crossed the river and walked a bit further we'd have come to Abri de Poisson and Grand Roc (something like that). Didn't realise they were so close. A nice walk around Tayac and then back to Les Eyzies - a few things re-opened at 4pm!
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