NORMAN FOSTER'S VIADUCT

Before the weather broke last weekend I had the chance to accompany a group of Engineers from Nottingham on a pilgrimage to Lord Norman Foster's viaduct in Millau. The group were on one of our 'High-Tech' weekends which combine a tour of the Airbus plant in Toulouse with a day out in the Tarn and Aveyron wondering at the viaduct and marvelling at the largest brick-built building in the world, Albi Cathedral.As you can see from the souvenir photograph it was a sparkling Spring day which allowed us to admire Lord Foster's work from every angle before enjoying an excellent lunch in Millau (infamous, incidentally, in France as the site of the trashing of a McDonald's by one of this year's presidential candidates, José Bové). For the record, Mr Bové was not elected and we didn't eat in McDonald's!
Although Albi cathedral - Saint Cécile - is an imposing edifice of pink-red brick from the outside, it is its extraordinary painted interior which impresses the most; every inch of the walls and ceiling are covered with rich colours, stars and cherubs culminating in the frightful mural on the altar gable of Man's descent into hell. Grinning devils with forked tongues and gorgons with razor claws pull the poor sinners down into the flames as angels float helplessly above; must have been pretty scary for the poor folk back in the Middle Ages as they gazed up at this mayhem in the guttering candlelight - knowing that the Plague, the Inquisition or the Hundred Years War would probably claim them before they even got to the Heaven/Hell conundrum.

We didn't have time to visit the adjacent Bishop's Palace and the permanent Toulouse-Lautrec exhibition that it houses ... but that's for another time.

What's nice about this 'high-tech' tour is that it combines pointy-end technology (the new A380 and the 343 metre-high viaduct) with a lot of which is decidedly non hi-tech and yet still very French: gloomy cathedrals, miles of unspoilt countryside and two-hour lunch breaks!