Click on any of the following for more information:
Sports and activities such as
- Land
Sports (cycling, horse riding, rugby, speleology
and off-road motorcycling)
- Water
sports (swimming, sailing, canal barges, SCUBA
diving, and river sports)
- Air
sports (flying, gliding, hang gliding, paragliding,
and hot-air ballooning)
- Mountain
sports (walking, climbing and caving)
- Winter
sports (dog sledding, downhill skiing, cross
country skiing, and ice skating)
- Hunting,
Hawking and Shooting, Angling
and Fishing.
|
|
|
More
sedate activities such as
- Petanque
- the Midi form of French boules
- Courses: painting
and other courses
including residential courses
- Cultural
activities theatre, poetry, pottery, sculpture, choirs,
music, and visiting the Languedocs many World
Heritage sites.
- Visiting
museums in the Languedoc-Roussillon
- Investigating
painting and other art in the Languedoc-Roussillon.
(Many famous artists have worked in the Languedoc-roussillon,
especially in Carcassonne,
Montpellier,
Port Vendres, Sète,
Collioure
and Céret
in the Pyrénées-Orientales
département and Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer
in the Camargue.
Among them are Paul
Gauguin, Vincent
van Gogh, Henri
Toulouse-Lautrec, Charles
Rennie Mackintosh, Henri
Matisse, Sir
William Russell Flint, Pablo
Picasso, Georges
Braque, Marc
Chagall, René
Magritte, and Salvador
Dali
- Annual
events fêtes, carnival, festivals, and exhibitions
(with separate pages for January,
February,
March,
April,
May,
June,
July,
August,
September,
October,
November,
December)
- Visiting
restaurants, sampling regional food specialities and
wine
tasting
- Golf
- Assorted pastimes including games
(tennis, and card games); educational courses;
and various kinds of research
(historical, heraldic, archaeological).
- Cruising
on the Canal
du Midi
And more sedate activities still, such as
See also Things to
See in the Languedoc where you can find out about visiting
cities of historical and architectural interest,
market towns and other towns,
villages
and bastides; Fortified and grand buildings of specifically
the so-called "Cathar
Castles" and other Châteaux;
Religious buildings: cathedrals,
churches, and other
ecclesiastical buildings; Aspects of nature including:
the
Languedoc Coast, wildlife
(other than just spotting it), and springs,
spas and grottoes
Languedoc and Midi Sports & Games
Tambornet.
The "tambornet" of Languedoc is an ancestor of
real tennis and hence lawn tennis, in which the players
use a kind of tambourine. It represents an intermediate
form of the game later than using the palm of the hand (as
in Eton Fives) and earlier than a specially designed a raquet
(as in real tennis and its many derivatives).
Rugby. Although not of Occitan origin,
has proved very popular in this area, both in its orthodox
version (Union with XV players ) and the so-called heretical
version (League wth XIII players).
Quilhas
de U èch. A form of skittles popular the
Aveyronin and originally from Bearn. It differs from more
conventional skittles or nine-pin bowls in the size of the
court. Players throw a ball at one skittle at very close
range with the intention of cannoning both ball and skittle
into other skittles. The skittles weigh a couple of kilos
each but the ball weighs 5 or 6 and is made of solid walnut
wood. The game was brought to Paris in the early Twentieth
century by a group of immigrants from the Aveyron. The game
is popular in the Rouergue. Summer championships attract
thousands of spectators. More info at http://www.aprene.org/spip.php?article233
and http://www.quilles.net/.
Bull-Running. Click on the following link
for more on bull-running
Click on the following external link to find out What's
on in the Aude
Click on the following external link to find out What's
on in the Herault
The present Languedoc
represents the southern half of the area covered by
the ancient Roman's first province outside Italy. The northern
part is now called Provence.
Provence and the Languedoc still share a common culture,
markedly different from that of Northern France. For more
on Provence and Provençal sport and cultural activities,
click on the following link to open a new window to Beyond
the French Riviera www.beyond.fr 
Back
to Things to See.
