Route details
Description
Happy hiking and remember that you are not alone on the trails you are about to travel. We therefore invite you to respect nature: avoid picking flowers and plants, do not leave any trash behind, respect inhabited places, stay on the trails, keep dogs on a leash.
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Your itinerary
Step 1: Fountain of Amourettes
In the 14th century, a young girl from the village of Ste-Pezenne and the son of the powerful lord of Surimeau made a promise to each other on these paths on the banks of the Sèvre. But, the lord was strongly opposed to the wedding and it was mad with despair that the “virginette” went off to mourn the rest of her life at the place of their meeting. The fountain of Amourettes was born from her tears.
Step 2: Washhouse of the fountain of the dead
Apart from the weekly laundry, the big laundry or “bugée” was only done once a year and the women gathered for the occasion. After boiling the laundry in a “ponne” with ashes, they went to the washhouse to rinse the “bujaaille”. Installed in a saddle to protect their knees and armed with a beater to wring out the laundry, discussions were going well around the washhouse of the fountain of the dead, so called because it is located below the cemetery. The day often ended with a meal and the "bugée" then became almost a popular celebration, "a women's festival", as the most optimistic people described it. On August 9, 1837, the municipal council of Ste-Pezenne purchased three acres of land for the said wash house. Great satisfaction for the washerwomen who no longer have to go down to the Sèvre.
Step 3: The Sainte-Pezenne footbridge
Take the footbridge to take yourself back a century and once again come across the soldiers from the Duguesclin barracks coming to dance and drink at the waterside tavern and count fleurette on the Chemin des Amourettes. This metal structure was built in 1880 to “facilitate relations between the Sainte-Pezenne district and the town of Niort”, the latter of which had contributed to its construction for the sum of 50 francs.
Step 4: Coquelonne, a kingdom for aquatic flora and fauna
Coquelonne, on the edge of the Sèvre Niortaise, is a little paradise on earth for the local natural heritage (yellow water lily, bastard iris, meadowsweet, comfrey, eel, pike, perch, bream, swan, gray heron, mallard duck, hen water, kingfisher…). Street of the same name, 30 m. from the Plaisance footbridge, a tavern was opened in 1948. Run by the Guénet family, in addition to the dance floor, it offered the rental of pedal boats in the 60s. Bought several times, the wooden tavern was transformed into a club at night in 1973.
Step 5: Surimeau Donkey Mill
The Moulin d'Âne is located Rue du Moulin d'Âne at the entrance to the Pont de Surimeau, connecting the Sainte-Pezenne district to that of Surimeau. The name given to this mill has evolved a lot over the centuries, but it seems that a root, common to all these names, has stood the test of time.
Step 6: The wood of the Touches
Soak up the forest atmosphere created by the large ash trees, sycamore maples and hazel thickets. In May, breathe in the carpets of wild garlic in bloom, the scent of blooming hyacinths and honeysuckle. Listen to the song of the tits, warblers and orioles, the chattering of the oak jay and the drumming of the great spotted woodpecker. When autumn comes, taste the hazelnuts that have fallen to the ground before the squirrel feasts on them. The Bois des Touches, a refuge for rich and diverse flora and fauna, benefits from a classification measure to preserve it.
Step 7: Channels and mills
Observe the Sèvre Niortaise flowing peacefully to suddenly flow into a gentle waterfall... It is a causeway, a stone dam which partially diverts the watercourse to power the mill wheels downstream. On April 7, 1864, the prefect of Deux-Sèvres authorized the four owners of the Sainte-Pezenne mills – Compéré, Anne, Bégrolles and Grange – to undertake work on channeling the course of the river to their factory. It was still the golden age of the Sèvre mills which transformed the grains of wheat harvested on the plateaus into white flour exported as far as the Antilles! After the war of 14, the appearance of electric flour mills led to the disappearance of mill activity. Upstream of Moulin d'Anne, the reach is converted into a municipal swimming pool. Imagine bathers in one-piece suits, wooden cabins and diving boards!
Step 8: Chantemerle Castle
Beyond a gate, a castle directly inspired by Perrault's tales... Built in the 19th century, the Chantemerle castle nevertheless presents 17th century architecture. The theatrical side and surprise effects of Baroque art are sought after. Observe the balcony supported by sculpted consoles and the central bay marked by a triple bay decorated with a garland. The most spectacular undoubtedly remains the four false corner towers marked by a projection which gives this modest-sized castle all the scale and prestige of the great monuments. Several annexed buildings enrich the character of this local heritage: a long avenue of stables and outbuildings, the remains of a chapel, an orangery and a horse riding arena, visible from a gate below, which was used to go up the water from the Sèvre.
Step 9: Operating site of the regional horticultural vocational school
Inauguration in 2005. Production of fruit and ornamental trees, hedge shrubs and flowers. On 4 ha: 10.000 m2 of open-ground crops; 6.000 m2 of platform for container cultivation; 2 greenhouses of 400 m2; a cold room for storing cut flowers and floral arrangements; a building including a sales greenhouse, an operating building with sanitary changing rooms and classrooms, a meeting room and staff accommodation! A water recycling and irrigation system, “a first in France”, saves 1 m80.000 of water!
Step 10: Orientation table
From right to left, the Ste-Pezenne, St-Etienne and Notre-Dame churches, the Niort Town Hall, the Donjon, the St-André church, the former Duguesclin barracks, the St-Hilaire church, the Departmental Archives of Deux-Sèvres, the Family Allowance Fund and the castle of Beure-Baillon.
Step 11: View of the Burbaillon castle
This castle was built in the 1th century French style by Pierre-Théophile Segrétain, XNUMXst departmental architect of the Deux-Sèvres Historical Monuments. It belonged to Louis Arnauldet, friend of Segrétain, president of the civil court of Niort, municipal councilor of Niort and deputy of Deux-Sèvres in the XNUMXth century.
Step 12: Bride's Path
As soon as the religious ceremony was completed, the nuptial procession left the church and escorted the bride to a platform located on the heights of the plateau. The custom then wanted the young bride to dance on a carpet of wild thyme so that she would always have plenty of milk for her offspring. The guests shared the cake or even the blessed bread and then began an almost solemn walk along a specific route, called for this reason the Bride's Path, without which the beauty would have no descendants!
Step 13: Croix du Vignau(lt)
Existence of these small monuments since the advent of Christianity. Multiple uses: wayside cross serving as a landmark for travelers, justice marking the location of the gallows, cemetery replaced or supplemented by a hossannière cross or a lantern of the dead, place to moralize the commercial transactions taking place nearby, commemoration often due to a war or banditry, pilgrimage, mission, jubilee, that marking the location of a disappeared religious building...
Step 14: Sancta Peccina Church
It is the oldest church in Niort. The primitive building, built on the site of a pagan temple dedicated to Thor, was rebuilt at the end of the 2003th century. at the beginning of the 1147th century, reworked in the 1557th century. in the XNUMXth century, then registered in XNUMX. At the time of Clovis, the Pezenne nun fled to Aquitaine from her native Spain where persecution reigned. After walking for a long time with her companions Macrine and Colombe, she died of exhaustion on a hillside overlooking the Sèvre Niortaise. Miraculous healings around his tomb are the origin of a very popular pilgrimage. In XNUMX, on the occasion of the Second Crusade, Eleanor of Aquitaine donated the remains to the Count of Vermandois who took them to the north of France, to Saint-Quentin. The city was taken in XNUMX by the army of Philip II of Spain. The emperor gives the relic to his sister, Empress of Germany.