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TheCaptain visited on 11th Sep 2005 - their rating: Cond: 4 Amb: 4 Access: 5 This is a very interesting place, one of only a few known examples in the world, with its intermittant spring gushing from a cave in a cliff face beside the road, well signposted a kilometre or so to the south of the little Pyrenean town of Belesta. In the dry summer months, due to a complex and not fully understood syphoning mechanism, the spring alternates between full flowing river, and barely a trickle, on an approximately hourly cycle for about 4 months of the year. The place has been well done up since I was last here 5 years ago, with new parking area, a pedestrian bridge built over the stream, and a building with shop and cafe facilities, with more planned such as a picnic site and nature walk, and there were quite a lot of people here. When I arrived, the spring was gushing quite a lot, the water easily covering the little steps across the entrance into the cave, just as it was every other time I have visited here in the past (I think I have been here about 4 times before, and never seen the spring dry up). So I went for a look round the little info centre, which now has a bar and lots of information about various tourist places and things, and was being run by a nice friendly couple, and it even has information leaflets about the spring in English these days. This explains the best understanding of the springs working, and states that it does not start cycling until after a long dry spell in the summer (I had always been in spring or early summer before). As I left the centre, and had another look at the spring, it seemed to be slowing down. After another 5 minutes, the flow had lowered enough that a chap could walk across the steps and into the cave. Ten minutes later, it had slowed right down to a trickle, allowing people to walk across the stepping stones into the cave. It was not easy to see where the water comes from, it must be somewhere under the floor of the pond. As would be expected of such a strange place, it has been revered since time immemorial, and of course there are many legends and stories associated with it. Excellent, I have at last seen this thing at work !

TheCaptain visited on 24th Apr 2000 - their rating: Access: 5 Lovely sunny day exploring in the Ariege hills. Puivert castle. Fontestorbes intermittent spring fascinating. Montsegur Castle. Pass de ? closed. Plain de ? Ax-les-Thermes, Col de Portel, scary roads. Mas D’Azil. Toulouse late.



Average ratings for this site from all visit loggers: Access: 5

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