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LES FONTANELLES RECEPTION FACILITIES

Les Fontanelles reception facilities

Deep in the heart of the Montagne Noire (Black Mountains), a 670 sqm architecture subjected to nearly two centuries of weathering. Take your seminar, R’training, scientific lecture, plant visit or day’s work in the middle of an authentic scenery; two rooms, different in capacity ( from 20 to 150 attendants) among which a 150 seat auditorium, with a view into the park, the Montagne Noire and the Thoré valley. A large beautiful restaurant room and its bar.

Registered training centre

Route map

When back in 1999 we acquired the Estate of the Fontanelles, the harsh winter weather hadn’t spared this edifice constructed in 1870. Built in schist stone under Napoleon III, this 600sqm cowshed used to shelter 80 cows downstairs. The hay was carted upstairs where it was left to dry off and could be preserved thanks to loopholes. Saying that the cow-keeper had his place and slept among his cows is not a legend. The inhabitants of the estate could live self-sufficiently, thanks to the baker’s oven in particular, which was renovated in 2002.

Throughout the 40 ha of land, 12 pesquiers or dry-stone walls waterproofed by a bulk of earth downhill, made it possible to store great quantities of water in the winter to irrigate the prairies and cereal crops in the summer. A buried terracotta water pipe built in 1910 and rehabilitated today, could supply the great pool in the yard by tapping the water from the stream of the Fontanelles situated 600 hundred meters to the west.
The olive trees which have always marked the limits of the Mediterranean region had been present in the Montagne Noire until the 1956 severe winter frosts. In 1999 we replanted olive trees from Uzès and from Andalusia, they’re 50 years old today and struggling to adjust to the climate here at the crossroads of the mediterranean and oceanic climate. The five Fontanelles wardens standing by the car-park remind everyone of the strong influence exerted by the Cathari in our region located just a few kilometers away from one of the highest strongholds of catharism in the XIIIth century.

From 1999 to 2007 and mostly during our spare time, we patiently undertook the renovation or rather the revival of these ancient imprints of a world of peasants with a strong Occitan twang. We passionately took up the restoration of the place and tried to preserve all its charismatic and pristine character while trying to adjust it to our needs : reuniting our partners, customers and friends in order to introduce our corporate approach and our attachment to a sustainable agriculture. Gazing into the future with deep respect for our forebears and for our followers.

Welcome to this place, get immersed and enjoy its magnetic attraction and charm of the past. Almost all of us come from that hard-working and courageous French peasantry which counted 90% of the French population in the XIXth century. « Ne quid Nimis », nothing in excess, could be the motto of the place. We preferred to have « Carpe diem », seize and enjoy the present day, carved on the wall, a phrase from the Latin poem Odes by Horace to remind everyone that life is short and must be enjoyed without delay.

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