Issue No. 16

Long ignored by mass tourism, this tranquil region is fast becoming France's
hot new destination says Sue Aran who lives in the Gers where she runs
French Country Adventures guided tours of Gascony…
Where is Gascony?
The area of Gascony is bordered on the
west by the Atlantic Ocean, the south by
the Pyrénées mountains, the east by
Toulouse and the north by the vineyards of
Bordeaux. It’s a region that’s sprinkled with
ancient Roman ruins and humble bastides
and it remains as historically rich as it was
in medieval times.
Unchanged since the 1950s by industry,
tourism or major highways, its landscape
has remained agricultural for centuries.
Soft white clouds languish in deep blue
skies above fields of bright yellow
sunflowers, sun-kissed vineyards that
stretch to the horizon, and velvet green
pastures dotted with gaggles of geese and
cream-coloured cows, Gascony’s appeal is
seductively earthy, full-bodied and lusty,
like its wines. It’s a culinary heartland of
garlic, foie gras, duck confit, and France’s
oldest brandy, Armagnac, and is as
authentically farm-to-table as it gets.
Gascony entered recorded history during
the reign of Julius Caesar as the core
territory of Roman Aquitania. Its fertile soil
was nourished by the rivers descending
from the Pyrénées to the plains below. In
his memoir, Caesar described the
machinations occurring during his nine
years of fighting the Gauls, an alliance of
nine tribes which included the Vascones.
The Vascones defined a confederacy of
non-Romanised tribes who inhabited both
sides of the Pyrénées and shared common
traditions. By the late 6th century several of
their tribes moved north, over the Pyrénées,
and down into the territory they called
Vasconia, which now comprises the seven
departments in southwestern France called