title	Le Gouffre Géant and Grotte de Limousis, Petanque and a Lightning Storm, Languedoc, France - 12th August 2018
intro	Another of the recommendations of the dude who owns the house is a visit to some nearby caves - the Gouffre Géant at Cabrespine and the Grotte de Limousis. The Gouffre Géant wins on sheer epic scale (it's truly enormous) but we do the smaller of the two, at Limousis, first, and it proves to be the better visit. This is partly because the tour actually takes us through several chambers in the extensive cave system, so you get to feel a bit more like you're actually exploring the underground world, but also because the guide is amusing and talks slowly and clearly enough so that we can both easily translate for the boys, so that they also know what's going on. The tour of the Cabrespine "giant" is much less extensive and the tour guide rattles through her spiel rapidly and with a heavy accent, making it frankly baffling. However, the size of the cave is truly staggering, so it's still worth a look. In between the two, we stop off at Villeneuve de Minervois for a spot of lunch, and afterwards, after Harry spots some actual otters in the river, as we head back to the Cité of Carcassonne to watch the evening light show of the living stones: Les pierres sont vivantes en ma Cité de Carcassonne! Later, it's the night of the Perseid meteor shower maximum, but as usual the weather conspires to render the whole thing moot again. However, at least time there's some compensation by way of a spectacular lightning storm over Carcassonne. Before that, we're eating out again whilst watching a keenly-played game of petanque, and before all of that we spend a second day down at Lac de la Cavayére, for another swim in the warm, fresh water.
imgp3470	Isobel has a tiny coffee as we wait for the tour
imgp3471	Fred's up in the rocks
imgp3473	The tour group assembles by a small door to the cave
imgp3474	Harry and Isobel appear
imgp3490	Stalagmites are nicely reflected in water
imgp3493	More rock features
imgp3497	The green pool, which stays at 8°C all year round
imgp3499	The tour guide perches on a fence
imgp3503	Twisty rocks
imgp3511	Delicate crystals in the Aragonite "chandelier"
imgp3521	More stalagtites
imgp3524	The tour continues through the cave system
imgp3529	The tour guide pretends to hold up the cave
imgp3530	Spectacular columns of concretion on the way out
imgp3532	Hundreds of needle-like stalactites dangle
imgp3533	Fred leaves the cave
imgp3540	The town of Villeneuve de Minervois and some vines
imgp3541	The sleepy town of Villeneuve
imgp3542	We walk around Villeneuve
imgp3544	Another café lunch
imgp3546	There's a fiddle statue like at Cambridge Folk
imgp3547	Tree-covered French street
imgp3551	A closed-up bakers
imgp3552	Looking down from the top of the hill
imgp3553	Villeneuve back street and clock tower
imgp3555	Timber frame buildings
imgp3557	Harry eats a Croque Monsieur
imgp3559	Harry's got ice cream all over his face
imgp3561	Up in the hills outside cave 2: the Gouffre Géant
imgp3563	The gang roam around
imgp3565	Cabrespine "giant hole" is not quite Gouffre Géant
imgp3577	This cave is 200 metres from top to bottom
imgp3583	Epic stalactite structures
imgp3584	The Jules Rimay world cup is framed
imgp3587	Millions of stalactites
imgp3588	More groovy stonework
imgp3595	Alien-like concretions
imgp3618	Regimented trees
imgp3621	We have lunch back at the house
imgp3622	Harry tries to hack up a cork
imgp3624	Harry's got some pants on outside his trousers
imgp3625	Fred does his astro jacks out in the street
imgp3633	Harry spots actual otters in the river
imgp3642	Isobel, Harry and Fred wander back up to the Cité
imgp3643	A shuttered-up hairdressers
imgp3644	The sun sets over Carcassonne
imgp3649	The boys run around again
imgp3650	The crowd gathers for a Son et Lumiere show
imgp3653	There are some impressive projections going on
imgp3654	A map of France in lights
imgp3664	Some kind of dance occurs within the Château Comtal
imgp3666	More dancing in the Château
imgp3668	A dancer stands on his head
imgp3680	Harry looks a bit glum
imgp3684	We're in a café by the lake
imgp3688	A long and dusty track
imgp3689	Fred's looking for grasshoppers again
imgp3691	Some dude plays guitar to himself
imgp3694	Harry joins in with grasshopper chasing
imgp3701	Some boys hurl themselves off the pedalo pier
imgp3705	A water hydrant is leaking
imgp3707	Boules in the Bastide of Carcassonne
imgp3709	Thumbs up during a game of Petanque
imgp3715	The game of boules is on
imgp3717	The next shot is considered
imgp3728	The cochinelle is retrieved
imgp3737	It's time for tea
imgp3739	Isobel and the boys
imgp3741	The boys look for lizards in the drainpipes
imgp3744	Old posters on the door
imgp3745	An old, broken, Pepsi noticeboard
imgp3746	More posters, including Tintin
imgp3747	The boys are a blur as they run around in the rain
imgp3750	The boys in the rain
imgp3753	It's lashing it
imgp3755	We retreat inside the Brasserie des Platanes
imgp3756	The Brasserie des Platanes in the rain
imgp3758	Harry's still in the rain
imgp3764	A sign from Billingsgate fish market
imgp3767	Harry's got wet hair
imgp3769	A wet street
imgp3812	Lightning fills the sky and brings day to night
imgp3819	Some in-cloud lightning over Carcassonne
imgp3839	There's a low-down flash of lightning
imgp3871	Filligree traces of a horse's head in the clouds