Peyrepertuse France

We got up on Tuesday the first morning in our crazy cool house!  It was quite the place!  Look at this table (I know right?)  It could seat 14-15 at a time.  Just what we need when we travel together with the Johnsons.  The house was pretty amazing and tucked away in a little nook of Quillan France……a small village in the French countryside not really famous for anything, except having a whole lot of charm.  It was perfect for us. 

And the living area/ front foyer…… after getting moving and feeding this crazy crowd, we headed for the vans and a hiking outing nearby. 

Peyrepertuse (or Pierre Pertuse) is a ruined fortress and one of the so-called Cathar castles located high in the French Pyrénées in the commune of Duilhac-sous-Peyrepertuse, in the Aude département, and has been associated with the Counts of Narbonne and Barcelona. It stands at 800m high. The name of Peyrepetuse derived from the ancient language called Occitan and means Pierced Rock. The castle was built on a strategic location along the French/Spanish border by The kings of Aragon (lower) in the 11th Century and by Louis IX (higher) later on. The two castles are linked together by a huge staircase. However, the castle lost importance as a strategic castle when the border of the two countries was moved to the south in 1659, causing the castle to be abandoned. During the Albigensian Crusade it served as a Cathar haven and stronghold, but was handed over to French forces without a battle in 1240. Known as one of the "five sons of Carcassonne" — several castles along the border between France and Spain — the French fortified the castle in 1242 to protect the border. (Wikipedia)
We drove past several hill side towns that looked like this and finally arrived at our destination: 
     
It was a lot colder this day than we would have prefered and even threatened to rain, but we still enjoyed climbing everywhere and almost having the place to ourselves.