Ponots, the people who are from Le Puy, in my brief and narrow experience, are very friendly and proud of their city and its traditions. I learned about the 14th century Fountain of the Choristers, named after a little singing boy, from a beautiful girl with perfect lilting English from the Specialities de la Region shop on the corner. She used to work on the tourist train which wended through the city ferrying international tourists with their snapping cameras. (Apparently more photographs have been taken globally in the last year than in all the years since 1839 when Daguerre and William Fox Talbot introduced their respective photographic processes. However, I digress as this is not a fact I learned from her but from Hugh Laurie on Desert Island Disks.)
The girl rattled off her tour guide speil and frequently laughed, when to her surprise and perhaps relief, she found that she had forgotten entire segments and that her dates were rather rusty. The fountain has exceeding clear water, I must taste it, as it is supplied by a local volcano and is directly on the thirsty pilgrim's route to the Cathedral. This road is called Rue de Tables because lace makers would put their tables outside, which they still do today, and work, hoping to attract custom from the passing crowds.
The final flight of 60 steps up to the Cathedrale de Notre Dame du Puy
The decorative facade is made of white limestone and black volcanic breccia is similar
to the Abbaye Saint-Chaffre in Le Monastier-sur-Gazeille
A tourist, as I doubt a Ponot would have the need to do something quite like this,
followed me into a side chapel, and laid herself down on a huge marble slab marking the
burial place of someone special. Then like a dog who circles inside its bed several
times before it feels suitably comfortable, she rolled over, slid about, wrestled with
her handbag until she found a natural position for an afternoon break.
The shoes of the Virgin Mary
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