Attractions and Places To See around Belluire - Top 13

You can also spend a night at the Saint James House B&B, quality guest rooms, swimming pool and view of the Donjon 🙂

The keep of Pons is located in the commune of Pons in the French department of Charente-Maritime in the Nouvelle-Aquitaine region. This tower is the old keep of the castle of Pons. 33 m high, it is visible from a long distance and is the symbol of the city. With the Saint-Gilles chapel, the remains of the ramparts and the main building, it constitutes the remains of the ancient castle of Pons.

This Templar chapel was built in the 12th century and renovated in 1706. It was acquired in 1949 by Mr. and Mrs. Frédéric, the current owners, who completely restored it. Since 1986, on August 15 of each year, a mass has been celebrated there.

This Romanesque church was built in the 12th century, but all that remains of the original building is the bell tower. It was modified in the 15th and 16th centuries. A Renaissance style facade replaces the original facade and the square bell tower was built in the 12th century.

Dating from the Gallo-Roman period, the so-called "Pas de la Mule" bridge is located on the Seugne. Made up of 6 blocks of stone, it linked the village of Lansac to a water mill called "la cité". It also allowed the passage of animals transporting cereals and flour between the watermill, in the commune of Saint Georges Antignac, and the windmills of Les Groies in Clion.

For people with a head for heights, it is worth climbing the 30-metre-high tower. There is also a museum in the building. It is one of the 'Monument historique' in France.

Charming little piece of nature. The chapel (above) can be visited when it is open. A skeleton welcomes you but don't worry, it is very discreet!

Located on the edge of town, at the crossroads of 2 roads of ancient origin, the church is on an elevated position. The openings pierced in the upper part of the walls of the nave (reminiscent of the Languedoc "mirandes") are the most remarkable feature of the monument and seem to attest that the church was, if not fortified, at least fitted out as a refuge. The church has a cruciform plan which was not to be the case originally, because the arms of the transept, whose vaults are very low compared to that of the nave, are connected rather awkwardly to the latter by a incoherent molding system. It is not excluded that these transepts, very wide and each lit, to the north as to the south, by a large oculus obviously late, replaced a transept of more modest size. The fact that the cupola on squinches, decorated in the lower part with modillions in the shape of heads, and surmounted, on the outside, by a beautiful bell tower whose lower part is from the Romanesque period, was not placed according to the use at the crossing, but was moved above the right bay preceding the semi-circular apse, does not plead in favor of this hypothesis. It is more likely that the church originally only had a single nave. A partial collapse profoundly altered, at an early date, the external appearance of the apse by causing the disappearance of 3 of the 5 veneered arches which reinforced it on the outside. However, if we judge by the 2 arches still in place on the south side as well as by the beginning of the arch remaining on the north side, the whole of the apse included a very neat decoration of capitals and corbels ( with a very beautiful female head on the south side and an astonishing bearded head in the northeast corner). The relative abundance and quality of the carved decoration is one of the interesting aspects of the church of Guitinières. The western portal has 3 bare arches, between which are inserted decorative cords, and a 4th arch decorated with "honeycombs". If the capitals of the 3 bays of the nave are of good quality (one of them was recut at the end of the Middle Ages and shows 2 figures of angels), those of the bedside are remarkable: we see men surrounded of monstrous animals caught in vegetal intertwining and an image of Lust. Stylistically, these capitals are very similar to those of the nave of Saint-Eutrope de Saintes. and the intervention of a sculptor from this workshop, the third active on this particularly important site, seems very likely, with however, on the south side and in an inconspicuous location, the unexpected presence of a capital decorated with bare palmettes but very prominent, rather reminiscent of the capitals of the southwest. The furniture of the church of Guitinières is rather poor; at the base of one of the engaged columns of the nave, on the north side, an inscription preserves the memory of the repair of the paving in 1732. The neo-Romanesque altar fits quite well into the volume of the apse; but it is especially necessary to note the presence, in the north crosspiece of 2 Angels Worshipers in stone, which could date from the beginning of the 19th century. and which are most likely the remains of a rather ambitious altar decoration.