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Sometimes we are tempted from our mountain hideaway to the bright lights of the big city, tempted by our consumerist desires, we brave the crowds and the traffic. This time it was the need to buy materials for the renovation of the salle de classe, that we could not get locally, I say this time but in fact it is nearly always to buy renovation materials.

Having satiated our consumer desires, with the purchase of two suspended toilets, and 12 bottles of burgundian white wine, we found we had time to spare. A rare opportunity to explore! We therefore set of for Pont-du- chateau. Follow our progress through this historic town.

Pont du chateau is a small town with yes you guessed it a chateau and a bridge, and if you thought where there is a bridge, there must be a river, you would be right. The Allier is the river flowing down below the old towns ramparts.

The Chateau dates from the middle of the XVII century and is the work of Guillame Montboissier Beaufort Canillac and was financed by his friend Cardinal Mazarin. The Montboissiers were exiled to England in the 18th C. because of the Revolution.

The day was sunny and the newly arrived swifts filled the air with their shrieks. Like them our spirits took wing with the arrival of such a lovely day.We were not the only ones to be taking in the sun. Just below the Chateau the old men of the village enjoyed a game of petanque beneath the flowering horse chestnut trees.

The town is quiet and it is hard to imagine it as it was in its heyday as a thriving river port, in fact there were five ports just in Pont du chateau . Hundreds of miles from the sea, river barges carried all manner of goods from the Auvergne, coal, fir trees for masts for the Navy of Louis XIV, strong wine for Paris, paper from the paper mills of Auvergne well known for its quality and of course hemp for making ships sails. All of these goods passed through Pont du Chateau. The sailors, bargistes, porters who made the journey to Paris with the boats, many never returned preferring to stay after selling their cargo, breaking the boat up and selling the wood those that did not stay walked back to build another boat and make the journey again until they too had made enough money so they need not return.

The town is close to the administrative centre of the Auvergne, Clermont-Ferrand and not far from the ancient cutlery producing town of Thiers. Well placed to trade with them both and to act as port for them both. 

St Martine church is a good example of its kind, unfortunately the door was locked so no photos of its painted interior . . .

. . . but hey stone coffin anyone.

Political concerns are foremost in the minds of many even in this quiet town, sharpened no doubt by the global financial crises, and the general consensus (correctly held or not, it is not for me to say) that the government of President Sarkosy is not doing enough to help the common man. The European elections could well provide a means to voice that discontent.

The Allier is like all rivers in the Auvergne and indeed all of the Auvergne clean and general untouched by pollution, and as such is home to the rare freshwater grayling a fish sensitive to pollution. Other species of note that can be found along the length of the Allier are salmon, beaver, and otter. The Allier springs in the Massif Central at 1500m altitude before pouring its waters into the Loire 421km later. It is funny to think that the rain that falls on our village some 70km away, by way of many streams and a tributary of the Allier passes under this bridge and thus to the Loire and on to the Atlantic.

The river, any river is quite  an apt symbol for the Auvergne. The Auvergne volcanic rock filters rainfall that is eventually bottled and then sits expensively on many a table, Volvic is but one name. In our village like others in the Auvergne our tap water is French mineral water taken from a spring rising in the village and piped to all the houses in the village, almost every pasture and meadow has water bubbling out of it. Rivers powered some of the first industry. Paper has been made in the valleys around where we live since the crusades at its height over 300 working water powered paper mills pulped and mashed reams and reams of paper. The always flowing river urgently making its way to the sea also reminds me that many throughout history have sought their livelihood somewhere other than the Auvergne, the rural exodus has left its own mark upon the landscape, abandoned houses and villages less cultivated land and more forest.

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Hope you enjoyed your cup of coffee and the tour of Pont-du-Chateau.