The Via Domitia was constructed in 118 BC around the same time the first Roman colony in Gaul, Colonia Narbo Martius (Narbonne) was founded. The Via Domitia connected Italy and modern day Spain. The road crossed the Alps by the Col de Montgenèvre, followed the valley of the Durance, crossed the Rhône at Beaucaire passed […]
Once the snake was caught, the hawk would grip the reptile by the tail and swing the snake against either a tree or a rock and knock it unconscious before taking its prey back to the nest. The Limerick Snake Hawk was a clinical hunter. At the zoo, the last surviving hawk never missed the […]
St Guilhem Le Desert is named after a grandson of Charles Martel who became one of the most trusted commanders of the Emperor Charlemagne. After an epic campaign against the Saracens, Guilhem returned home to find his wife had died during his time away. He decided upon a life of solitude and handed over his […]
This voluntary society goes around collecting used bubble-wrap from large firms, cutting it into strips two feet in height, and then taping it to lamp-posts in areas where there is a high number of people texting while ignoring their surroundings. Two layers of bubble-wrap will suffice for protecting texters who are walking along, but five […]
Legend has it that St Patrick removed all the snakes from Ireland. This theory has no real basis in fact. What’s more likely is that snakes were hunted to extinction by the highly efficient raptor called the Limerick Snake Hawk, the last of which died in Dublin Zoo in 1926 having survived on a diet […]
Pezenas is a wonderful old town in the Languedoc. The town has been in existence since Roman times and became wealthy due to the sale of woollen cloth. In 1456 the States General of Languedoc met here for the first time and then the governors of Languedoc made the town their residence. Pezenas had become […]
