The Poitou Charentes

The countryside of the Poitou Charentes offers a region full of surprises, ideal for discovering on a relaxed walking or cycling holiday. Often driven through, but seldom truly discovered, the pretty villages are sleepy. Friendly farming folk work their land, a patchwork quilt of fields of golden corn, sunflowers and maize. Dairy cattle and sheep graze in fields bordered by ancient oak and pine woods. The weather is warm, often quite hot in summer. The autumns are lovely with long golden days.

This is a region rich in architecture. Situated on the Saint Jacques of Compostella route, hundreds of churches were built here during the 11th and 12th centuries. One of the most impressive has to be Notre-Dame-la-Grande, in Poitiers. The church was built during the reign of Eleanor, Duchess of Acquitaine. After her marriage to Henry II in 1152, much of this region, and that of southwest France, was under English control for 300 years.