St. Yrieix-le-Perche

St. Yrieix-le-Perche is a town with every convenience or service you will need. Currently building of an olympic sized indoor pool, together with water flumes and sports facilities is taking place, which is expected to open Summer 2008. The inner town centre is extremely quaint with cobbled roads and many boutiques, including porcelain shops which sell the famous Limoges china. A Farmers Market takes place here every Friday.

There are five large supermarkets, some even open all day and Sunday mornings! There is a library, cinema, many varied restaurants and bars where you can have superb French meals, Italian cuisine or chill out with a coffee or a beer or two. There is a wonderful Plan d'Eau for the community, featuring fishing, swimming, water sports and lovely walks. It is the venue for Bastille evening, with the most magnificent display of fireworks.

Limoges

Limoges is approximately 25 minutes drive north from St. Yrieix-le-Perche where you can find everything you would expect from a Large City, with high speed rail links to Paris and the Channel Tunnel.

Limoges Belgard Airport is only 35 minutes drive north of St. Yrieix-le-Perche with flights to: London-Stanstead, Nottingham, Newcastle, Southampton, Liverpool, Paris Roissy CDG, Orley-West, Lyon, Nice, Corsica-Figari.

Coussac-Bonneval

Coussac-Bonneval is approximately 8 km from the town of St. Yrieix-le-Perche and is an extremely pretty village with many amenities including 2 convenience stores, hardware/blacksmiths, a bakery, butchers, pharmacy, post office, doctors, garage, hairdressers, florist, 2 hotels and 2 bars plus a Tabac and a lovely church. There are also two schools for children aged 4 to 11.

Coussac-Bonneval is one of those small places which promises nothing special on the map but turns out to be a delightful surprise, largely because of its beautiful moated chateau.  To the medieval landed gentry, a good solid drawbridge would have seemed like the ultimate in home security. 

With the exception of brief period in the thirteenth century, when mysterious outsiders seized their turreted manor house, the Bonneval family have lived peacefully in the village of Coussac-Bonneval for nearly a thousand years.

Twenty-first century visitors can tour the Bonneval family home – now in the hands of the 23rd Marquis – and cross the double drawbridge for themselves.  A small one for pedestrians beside a larger version for heavier traffic.

The castle is opened to visitors every day from 15th March to 2nd November, from 14.30 to 19.00 (July, August and September) and from 14.30 to 18.00 (March, April, May, June, October and November). Group Visits (20 persons minimum), all around the year by appointment. Prices of visits: 10€ adults, 6€ students, 5€ children.