Truffles and Wooly Mammoths

 October 19, 2021

Truffles and Wooly Mammoths

 We said goodbye to Bordeaux this morning and drove about three hours towards Sarlat, at which time we stopped at a truffle farm.  We had a lecture on truffles—more than you’d ever think there was to know.  White truffles, black truffles, the soil pH needed for them to grow, the tree roots they prefer to grow on (Green Oak, ordinary Oak, and Hazelnut trees), how you can identify a tree where there are likely to be truffles, how they grow on the superficial tree roots, and so on.  Although pigs have been used in the past to find truffles, now they use a special breed of dog, the Lagotto Romagnolo, which has been bred for 150 years just for this purpose.  We were told that when the newborn pups are nursing, their mothers are dusted with truffle powder so that they associate truffles with good things like mother’s milk.

 We then went out behind the building where we had learned all of this to the field where trees have been planted to promote truffle growth.  We were told that the truffle produces a kind of herbicide so you can identify the area under a tree where there are likely to be truffles:

The resident Lagotto Romagnolo was with us:

 

He was set to work finding truffles, which he did (click on the arrow for video):

 

Finally, we had a tasting of both white and black truffles:

We then drove into La Vezera valley, where humans have lived since early paleolithic times.  There are huge rock walls and extensive cave systems here.  Homes are built under the rocks:

 

We had lunch in a local restaurant and then visited Rouffignac Cave where there are animal drawings dating to the early paleolithic.  Very little is known about the purpose of the drawings, and there are very few drawings of humans; most of the representations are of large animals such as the woolly mammoth.  There is a rail track and cars with seats pulled by an electric engine for the very limited number of visitors allowed.  No photos are allowed.  The train pulled us about 1.5 miles into the cave system where we saw a truly remarkable collection of drawings on the walls and ceilings.  Here’s a sample woolly mammoth drawing from the internet:

The entire area has extensive cave systems with wall art, and we have more caves to explore.

 Finally we drove to the city of Sarlat-la-Caneda where we will stay for the next three nights.  It has a medieval core which is so authentic it has been used in many films.  We took a brief walking tour before dinner—a highlight is yet another remarkable roof style, limestone, seen well in this photo of the back of the church:

 

Tomorrow is market day here, which should be fun, and then we’ll go to the Dordogne Valley.  More then.