Port-Sainte-Marie, sur la route des pèlerins de Saint-Jacques

Port-Sainte-Marie is a small, long town between the river and the foot of a steep hillside. It has old half-timbered and corbelled houses around the church of Notre-Dame, which dates from the 16th century, and the 700-year-old church of the Templars. Lady Garonne is, as the seasons go by, sometimes clear and nonchalant, sometimes muddy and worrying. Thanks to the richness of its alluvial deposits, vegetables and fruits grow generously. The gradual rise above the steeples and roofs of the town opens up the landscape to the Garonne plain where the crops are spread out in a checkerboard pattern. Port-Sainte-Marie is at the crossroads of 3 Roman roads: Ténarèze, Clermontagne and Toulousaine. Formerly a place of pilgrimage for the Gabariers de la Garonne, today it is the pilgrims on their way to Santiago de Compostela who pass through these places.