Discover the Niort - Marais Poitevin Trail Station, its most beautiful landscapes and its best routes for a day, a weekend or a week of sport!
GERMOND-ROUVRE
Trail
Panneau carré blanc et noir avec intitulé Station de Trail
Nature (faune, flore)
This trail is part of the Niort - Marais Poitevin Trail Station.
A difficult route with a tricky section at the end that requires you to keep your body fresh to tackle the final difficulties. A trail just 20 minutes from the centre of town, giving you the chance to discover the Germond-Rouvre trail playground.
A favourite of the Niort Trail Station, with technical uphill and downhill sections. It's the kind of trail terrain you'd expect from a trail runner in the Alps!
Novices please refrain.
Germond-Rouvre is located on the secondary route to Santiago de Compostela via the Deux-Sèvres, which was used by the English, Normans and Bretons. It included a sick-bay, which was merged with the Château-Bourdin hospital (Saint-Pardoux-en-Gâtine) in 1695, and two almshouses, one of which was still in existence in 1786.
In the 13th century, the first bay of the church, built in the 12th century by the Poitevin monks, was topped by an enormous bell tower, a late and clumsy imitation of that of Secondigny and Parthenay-le-Vieux. The southern façade was flanked in the 15th century by a funerary chapel with flamboyant Gothic vaults. After the Concordat of 1804, one of the Baroque altars from Saint-Antoine-de-la-Lande was transferred to the sanctuary.
Stripped of its original vaults, only the apse and part of the nave remain. Have you noticed the carved bat?
Step 2: Fontaine de Naimbouc
The Naimbouc fountain was demonised at the time of the region's Christianisation to turn away new converts from this Gallic place of worship, the goat being one of the symbols of the evil one.
Step 3: Rochers de la Chaise
La Chaise, the highest point in Germond-Rouvre at 123 m, was owned in the 17th century by the widow of Chevalier Charles de Lusignan de Saint-Gelais, Marquis de Saint-Gelais. Today, the rocks of La Chaise are quarried in the "Pleige" quarry and used as a climbing site.
Ancient pilgrimage to the statue of Notre-Dame-de-la-Chaise in the valley of the Bourlot, a tributary of the Egray.
Step 4: Château du Luc
Facing the rocks of La Chaise, Le Luc, which dates back to at least Antiquity, is now a château rebuilt in 1830.
