This photo report is quite impressive. However, it was just a very, very small portion of what we did on the road trip that took us from the champagne, all the way down to Carcassonne, Queribus and Peyrepetuse, and all the way east to Nice; what I want to bring across here, is that the photos are of very crappy quality. I'm sorry for that.
You can also use this as a guide if you want to visit the valley yourself.
Ingredients of a succesful GK3 live tour;
- a hiking map of the valley; you can't do without it; all important stuff is marked there, very handy. You'll feel like Grace in no-time. You can buy it in the valley anywhere, but DON'T I repeat I FORBID you to go hiking without one. It's VERY dangerous, VERY rough area, VERY thick forest and you'll be lost in no time.
- a car; it's really tricky to do this without one. There's no bike rental, and the valley is larger than GK3 lets you believe. Public transport is horrible thin in this area (even though they have an active railroad). We own a Chrysler Sebring Convertible, so we were quite comfortable.
- hiking shoes. the area is one of the roughest in France, don't go without em.
Overview
Espéraza is quite a large town in the area, and it's where we had lodgings for a few days, in a beautiful villa. This overview of the valley from our backyard shows Rennes-le-Chateau very well. Very strategical location to build a city, as you can see. Also, the hill that lodges Rennes-le-Chateau is very...unforesty...compared to the rest of the Valley. Probably because there's thousands of human skeletons in it's hill because of the battles fought, you can feel it hiking the land, death all around. The rest of the valley however, is very fertile and THICK with mostly unhikable forest (unless you're into some rough survival challenge). GK3 let's you believe otherwise.
A hike to Rennes-le-Chateau
Here it is! Day two in the valley, and I'm already approaching Mekka!!!! Of course we could have driven up here, but where's the fun in that? Keen eyes can recognise Tour Magdala.
Yes, yes! It IS Tour Magdala! Mary, save me!
WTF? Sorry, I had to.
Just before entering the town, you get a great view of Tour Magdala.
It's the church....finally...Sauniere, reveal your secrets to me...
Church of Code
Argh...Dan Brown, you created another tourist trap!!! Lots of Nordic Walking Da Vinci Code tourists here...you'll have to use your elbows...sorry...the inscription above the door reads "This place is terrible".
Is this for real? I'm not going over the secret 'M' pattern of the saints with you AGAIN, my children, figure it out yourself.
There you are. Peek-a-boo. Asmodeus, my one and true God.
I stood watching this, waiting for the 'Trace' icon to appear, but it didn't. TILTED SQUARE!
St. Antoine de Padoue, notice how Jesus sits just like Asmodeus.
Ste. Germaine. Poof, and then there were flowers. Sorry for the bad pic.
St. Roch. "Nice legs", Gabe says. You only understand this if you know the story of Roch.
St. Atoine l'Hermite. The hermit. Need I say more?
Mary...don't be afraid, even the wind cries your name. Was it all worth it?
The altar view, with two babies, one on each side. Note that St. Joseph worship as a father figure is rare in the South of France.
Duality of the floor.
The graveyard door. Entrance forbidden. WTF? Why? Probably vandalism.
I'm sorry, I had to. I felt like Gabriel and Grace. At once. Go figure. Abbé Arnaud, are you there?
Yay. It looks very well taken care of.
Tour Magdala
So far was all free. Now, you'll have to start paying for those who own Villa Bethania, the adjacent building in which they made a crap ass museum, and the garden of Villa Bethania which houses Tour Magdala at the edge, and the Orangerie. We got in for free because my boyfriend is a journalist.
Time to enter Tour Magdala. Looks just like in the game.
Tile works in tact...
Yep, definately the great view up here.
Sauniere's orangerie. They didn't use it in the game, but it's a great location on the other side of the wall of Tour Magdala.
This is the view from the outside. They didn't allow photographs in Villa Bethania, so sorry. It was not all that special anyway. It's much smaller than you'd expect. The only thing really interesting in it is Sauniere's private chapel, in which he continued to preach after he was banned from the church.
Across from the front of Villa Bethania is the biggest tourist trap ever; a cafe in a ruin. We drank coffee there. They actually had the same hiking map we had hanging there, with all the secret geometries revealed. Nice. Also...this is the closest you will get to the town well / fountain displayed in the game; you can easily spot the old, round structure there. For the sake of inclusion I included this photo.
