Lascaux
Palaeolithic Painted Cave Discovered In 1940 And Closed To The Public Since 1963; Visitors See The Full Scale Replica At Lascaux IV In Montignac; Part Of The VéZèRe Valley UNESCO World Heritage Site Inscribed 1979 · Montignac, Nouvelle-Aquitaine
The original Lascaux cave is closed to the public and has been since 1963; what visitors see today is Lascaux IV, a full-scale replica built into the hillside below it, and it is a very good one. The real cave was found in 1940 by teenagers above Montignac in the Dordogne, and its walls hold some of the finest Palaeolithic paintings known, bulls, horses, stags and bison drawn around twenty thousand years ago. Crowds and their breath damaged the paintings, so the cave was sealed and a series of copies followed. Lascaux IV reproduces almost the whole cave, including the Hall of the Bulls and the Axial Gallery, with the rock surface, cool air and low light recreated, followed by galleries and films that explain how the art was made. Visits run as timed guided groups. The Vézère valley around it, listed by UNESCO in 1979, is full of prehistoric sites, and a few caves such as Font-de-Gaume still let small numbers of visitors see real paintings.
Avenue de Lascaux, 24290 Montignac-Lascaux, Dordogne, Montignac, Nouvelle-Aquitaine, France
Lascaux IV is open most of the year with seasonal hours: long days in summer, shorter hours in spring and autumn, and a closure of several weeks in winter, usually in January, plus some Mondays in the low season; confirm the current calendar before travelling. Every visit starts with a timed guided group through the replica cave, then continues at your own pace through the workshop galleries, so the time on your ticket is the time you must be there. In July and August and on French school holidays slots sell out, often days ahead, and turning up on the day can mean a long wait or no entry, so book online. Guided visits run in French and several other languages at set times, and English slots are fewer. The original cave on the hill above cannot be visited at all. Font-de-Gaume in Les Eyzies, one of the last caves with real polychrome paintings open to the public, admits only a small number of people a day, with a share sold in advance and a share on the day that goes early; confirm how tickets are released. Many other valley sites close in winter or open only on set days.