Argentat

The best way to approach Argentat is from the South, where the view across the Dordogne to the town is about as picturesque as you’ll find. There are houses of every shape and size, with dormers, gables, pepperpot towers, balconies and terraces; roofs of tile, slate or lauzes, thick, grey, lichen-covered slices of volcanic rock.

In the summer there are flowers everywhere, red and white, and the tables outside the Auberge des Gabariers are the ideal place to spend a sleepy afternoon. The Gabariers were the men who built and sailed the Gabares, vast clumsy boats of wood from the local forests, which took the produce of the upper Dordogne downstream to Libourne and Bordeaux, where the boats themselves were dismantled and sold to timber merchants. The Gabariers then walked back upstream and started all over again.