ANOTHER DAY IN GASCONY

A shot of part of the team just outside the walls in the bastide town of Montreal.

A rose amongst the thorns in Montreal.

Our first picnic and team photo outside the walls of the round bastide town of Fources in the Gers.

A note for the history buffs.

Bastides are fortified new towns built in the Middle Ages as a determined effort to colonize the wilderness, especially of southwest France which was a frontier region that belonged partly to France and partly to the kings of England.                                                                                                     Almost  700 of these new towns were built between 1200 and 1400.

Obviously, the built environment of the more important bastides has been significantly modified since mediaeval times, but in many of the more rurally sited bastides, the layout of streets and buildings has remained virtually unchanged for over six centuries.