In the east, ancient caves conceal Europe’s best treasure trove of prehistoric rock art.įuelled and fired for the morning, motor east to the village of Montignac, the incongruous home to the Dordogne’s greatest treasure: Palaeolithic cave art painted by Cro-Magnon artists in the Grotte de Lascaux and sensational replicas crafted with 3D printing and other modern-day digital whizz at Lascaux IV (Avenue de Lascaux 00 33 5 53 50 99 10). Then there is the landscape, a serene mirage of pastoral meadows and vineyards wrapped around chateaux, farms, honey-stone bastides (fortified hilltop villages) built by feuding French and English in the 13th century and – the pièce de résistance – the majestic twists and turns of the Dordogne River itself.
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Wine from Bergerac is not as revered as neighbouring Bordeaux vintages but it is eminently respectable – a glass of sweet Monbazillac paired with foie gras or summertime strawberries is a fine marriage indeed. The cuisine is sensational, combining seasonal fruits of the land with duck, goose and one of the most luxurious foods known to mankind, black truffles. It is not difficult to coax us British to the Dordogne in southwest France – the English fought the French over this glorious rural idyll until the end of the Hundred Years War (1453) for goodness sake.