Tori's Travels: Cro-Magnon's Castle

I was sifting through pamphlets about different châteaux in France, looking for something unique, but noticed all the descriptions were beginning to sound repetitive:

Oh, it's from the eleventh century? So is everything else around here.

Original, centuries-old furniture? Seen it.

Kings and Queens lived here? Old news.

I'm mostly kidding––I really love the chaâteax--but I wanted to see what else France had to offer. That's when Emme heard about a town in Southern France called Les Eyzies, which is known for its array of prehistoric artifacts. She only had to say the words "cave paintings" and I was on board ("EVERYBODY PUT ON YOUR SHOES AND GET YOUR BUTTS IN THE CAR NOW"). We tossed together some snacks, loaded into the mini-mini-van (cars in Europe are rather small) and started driving south.

It ended up taking several hours to reach Les Eyzies. We stopped at several fortresses and churches, had a picnic dinner, and toured the historical cities of Périgord and Bourdeilles. By the time we reached our "destination" it was two in the morning. No hotels were open, so we determined to be adventurous and camp out in the car. We drove down a quiet-looking road, parked and settled down for the night.

Did I say "for the night?" I meant for, like, forty minutes.

I woke up to car headlights beaming in my face and a man tapping on our window. He said something in French and motioned for us to leave. I had been sleeping in my contacts so my vision was awful and I was pretty disoriented. I don't know if Emme was much better, because in our attempt to get back to the main road we somehow took a wrong turn and got completely lost. The road we found ourselves on was narrow and unpaved, the trees sagged threateningly above us and there was no light beyond our mini-mini-van's headlights. It was a jungle out there.

(At this point, I decided to tell Emme scary stories about the Jersey Devil, my native folklore, which was fun until the moon rose––BLOOD RED--over the shadowy landscape. Creepy? Yes. After that I tried envisioning prehistoric animals scampering across the road or flitting through the murky shadows. Definitely got my unique experience.)

We eventually parked beneath massive cliffs once inhabited by cavemen. I didn't get much sleep, but those cliffs were the first thing I saw in the morning. Wow! It was such an amazing sight, I didn't even mind that I had spent the night crammed in a very little car. Well, I mostly didn't mind.

Les Eyzies is one of the most bizarre, remarkable towns I've ever seen. It has prehistoric roots, and many of the houses are from medieval times. They are built directly into the cliffside, adorned with brightly-painted shutters and window boxes.

I grabbed some pamphlets of local sights at the tourist office only to discover…more châteaux, of course! One caught my eye, however, a castle called Commarque, built atop caves containing artwork from our dear old friend, Cro Magnon, the earliest known form of modern human in Europe. Or something like that.

At Commarque, we picnicked (just a hint, I love picnicking) between a cool stream and stone that had been hollowed out for houses (the ground had shifted over the centuries so that we were now sitting beside where the roofs had been), while the castle ruins rose above us toward the bright sky. We took a hike in the woods along the ancient, man-made caves and ran around pretending to be Neanderthals.

Because we're American tourists and we do what we want.