Restaurant, Bookshop, Wine Cave
For excellent dining eat at Michelin rated Restaurant Relais Chantovent, reserve for a table on the new wide
terrace with lovely views
over the river gorge.
17 grand rue, Minerve.
04 68 91 14
18.
For wine visit Domaine Cavailles, 2 grand rue, Minerve for excellent and reasonably priced Minervois wines.
Minerve also boasts a fine bookstore - Paroli - where you can also buy coffee - it
has a good selection of new and used books everything from novels, art books
to regional, with collectors items too. There is an art gallery upstairs.
You
will find Paroli, at 8 bis rue des Martyrs, next to the Syndicate Initiative. (open every
day - 04 68 49 82 54. email: alain.monge@hotmail.com) .
Also there is Atelier des 3f, 7 rue des Matyrs - which has some fine jewellery and clothes created b43y Muriel and Carole, who expose their works and by others.
Wanting a bite to eat or a drink? Go round the corner to enjoy coffee, wine, beer, and bruschetta at the Chocobar.
Village Walks
Around and about the village are wonderful walks that test the
soul and one's agility. Walks that skirt edges of cliffs, with drops to the churning of water in streams that run through small holdings. The river Cessiere tunnels under hill, next to the village, and one can, if the water's not high walk through, to yet another tunnel that breaks its way through yet another hill. The natural bridges provide the ideal background to grand spectacles of Son et Lumière
in the Summer months.
Take a walk around Minerve in slide show.
Nearby Places to Visit
Driving or walking above Minerve, walking away from the tarmac road, one can find dolmens, majestic against the line of hills (left off the D 147, or higher up - in and around Bois-Bas) and the distant horizon of the Mediterranean, not far from caves painted in times even more distant.
Minerve, the jewel of a rock perched town, invites us to investigate the towns and country around. To drive to neighbouring Aigne, with its beautiful church, and streets shaped like a snail. To walk
along the Cessiére, near Cailhol, and bathe in cool spring fed river. To drive in the idyllic valley of Brian, and the
heights of Vélieux, or drive towards Caunes Minervois, and discover remote chapels, dolmens, and natural wonders, on the way home go to the
Canal du Midi, and take in a walk and a meal perhaps at a restaurant and see the canal boats pass by.
Drink wonderful wine, swim in the Med, mountain streams, discover castles, abbeys and artists and musicans who came - André Derain, Georges Braque, Henri Matisse, Pablo Picasso, C R Mackintosh, and Tsuguharu Fujita; or go a few steps to Spain and Catalonia land of Salvador Dali - Cadaquez, and Barcelona
Go to Lagrasse and discover CorbieresDrink wonderful wine, food, swim in lakes and mountain streams, discover castles, abbeys and artists and musicans
Discover the Cathars
Shepherd
Guardian of sheep
Slept the night
Stars bright
Sentry
Cave of man
Wood smoke
Baas of lambs
Stranger
Winds of silence
Almond blossom
Hill meets heaven
Southfrance.com is a website by Giles Mitchell also known as Giles Denmark - who has lived in the area for a long time. The website originated in 1995 by previous name www.le-guide.com. His father lived in Ouveillan, where Giles at one time painted a mural on the side of his father's house depicting a vineward and the silhouette of the village. The mural no longer exists as it was painted over in later years.
Giles Mitchell