France Cave with prehistoric art
Grottes de Cougnac
12 °C inside, all year.
Photo: Don Hitchcock, donsmaps.com · CC BY-SA 4.0
The descent
The entrance, at 211 m.
The real relief above Grottes de Cougnac, measured on the Copernicus model every 30 m, and the cave going down at the same vertical scale.
The depth is the one published by those who explored it; the shape of the galleries is a sketch, not a survey. No depth has been published for this cave yet.
211m
Entrance altitude
from the 30 m relief model
12°C
Inside, all year
the yearly average outside, at the entrance
21m
Rock above
the highest point within 1.5 km
Inside and outside
12 °C inside, all year.
Deep inside, a cave keeps the average temperature of the year outside: about 12 °C here, in January and in August. In August the afternoon reaches 28 °C at the entrance, 15 °C warmer than inside: take a jacket. The best months to escape the heat are from July to August.
- 8°0°Jan
- 9°0°Feb
- 13°3°Mar
- 17°6°Apr
- 20°9°May
- 25°13°Jun
- 27°15°Jul
- 28°15°Aug
- 24°11°Sep
- 19°8°Oct
- 12°4°Nov
- 8°1°Dec
Outside: afternoon and night averages for 1991–2020 (NASA POWER) brought to the altitude of the entrance. Inside: the yearly average, which deep parts of a cave keep. Near the entrance it follows the weather a little.
Cave in France
Grottes de Cougnac is a cave with prehistoric art in France. The entrance is at 211 m. It is closed to the public to protect it.
Getting there.
- No public accessProtected for science or for its art. Look for a replica or a visitor centre nearby.
- Gourdonnearest town · 2.4 km in a straight line
- Table d'orientationnearest viewpoint · 2.2 km from the entrance
- Brive Souillac airport (BVE)nearest airport with scheduled flights · 33 km in a straight lineCar hire at BVE airport (Brive)Discover Cars · sponsored link↗
Plan the visit
Guided tours, a bed nearby, a car.
Some links above are affiliate links: if you book through them we may earn a commission, at no extra cost to you. It never changes what the data on this page says.
From above.
The ground above the cave, with the relief shaded, the line of the section and what people have mapped around the entrance.
N
1.5 km
Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 (EOX, CC BY 4.0), 6.0 × 6.0 km, north up. The line is the section above. Points © OpenStreetMap contributors.
Around the entrance.
- 2other cave entrances within 3 kmGrottes de Cougnac
- 1springs within 2 km
- 1viewpoints within 3 kmTable d'orientation
- 7marked hiking routes within 3 kmLe sentier du bois Daurus, Le sentier d’Écoute s’il Pleut, Le chemin de Notre-Dame des Neiges and 4 more
- 18car parks within 2 km
- 17information boards and visitor centres within 3 km
- 1bus stops within 2 km
- 21campsites within 8 kmLa Clairière, Camping à la ferme, Camping Le Picouty and 18 more
- 49hotels and guesthouses within 8 kmMoulin des Vergnes, Hôtel du Pont, Hôtel Restaurant Bar La Légende and 46 more
- 18restaurants and cafés within 3 km
- sinkholes within 3 km
- caving clubs and spots within 15 km
- climbing crags within 3 km
- named waterfalls within 4 km
Counted in OpenStreetMap, the map anyone can edit, around the entrance. A low number may just mean nobody has mapped it yet. © OpenStreetMap contributors (ODbL).
Towns nearby
- Gourdon2.4 km in a straight line
- Le Vigan-en-Quercy5.3 km in a straight line
- Salviac12 km in a straight line
- Carsac-Aillac12 km in a straight line
- Domme14 km in a straight line
- Cénac14 km in a straight line
- Souillac18 km in a straight line
- Sarlat-la-Canéda19 km in a straight line
Month by month
The weather outside, at the entrance.
| Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Afternoon | 8 | 9 | 13 | 17 | 20 | 25 | 27 | 28 | 24 | 19 | 12 | 8 |
| Afternoon | 8 | 9 | 13 | 17 | 20 | 25 | 27 | 28 | 24 | 19 | 12 | 8 |
| Night | 0 | 0 | 3 | 6 | 9 | 13 | 15 | 15 | 11 | 8 | 4 | 1 |
| Rain (mm) | 73 | 51 | 68 | 76 | 82 | 67 | 52 | 56 | 52 | 66 | 74 | 71 |
| Rainy days | 12 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 11 | 9 | 10 | 10 | 12 | 13 | 13 |
| Sun hours/day | 2.5 | 4.1 | 5.3 | 6.4 | 7.0 | 8.7 | 8.9 | 8.1 | 7.2 | 4.9 | 3.1 | 2.6 |
| Snow on the ground (cm) | 6 | 5 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 4 |
| Afternoon | Afternoon | Night | Rain (mm) | Sun hours/day | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jan | 8 | 8 | 0 | 73 | 2.5 |
| Feb | 9 | 9 | 0 | 51 | 4.1 |
| Mar | 13 | 13 | 3 | 68 | 5.3 |
| Apr | 17 | 17 | 6 | 76 | 6.4 |
| May | 20 | 20 | 9 | 82 | 7.0 |
| Jun | 25 | 25 | 13 | 67 | 8.7 |
| Jul | 27 | 27 | 15 | 52 | 8.9 |
| Aug | 28 | 28 | 15 | 56 | 8.1 |
| Sep | 24 | 24 | 11 | 52 | 7.2 |
| Oct | 19 | 19 | 8 | 66 | 4.9 |
| Nov | 12 | 12 | 4 | 74 | 3.1 |
| Dec | 8 | 8 | 1 | 71 | 2.6 |
Averages 1991–2020 (NASA POWER) for a cell about 55 km wide, brought to the altitude of the entrance (211 m) with the standard lapse rate. Not a forecast.
Photographs
Inside and around.
Recent years
Wet years, dry years.
Rain of each month as a share of the 1991–2020 average. A dry year means a lower river and hotter rock; a wet one, more water in the gorge.
| Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2020 | 61% | 94% | 98% | 70% | 80% | 121% | 11% | 109% | 117% | 191% | 32% | 199% |
| 2021 | 106% | 127% | 33% | 36% | 118% | 195% | 108% | 43% | 185% | 60% | 57% | 144% |
| 2022 | 40% | 60% | 68% | 79% | 30% | 170% | 11% | 60% | 93% | 39% | 101% | 75% |
| 2023 | 75% | 29% | 102% | 79% | 69% | 143% | 57% | 86% | 71% | 148% | 193% | 164% |
| 2024 | 67% | 185% | 184% | 90% | 175% | 121% | 70% | 27% | 228% | 155% | 57% | 68% |
| 2025 | 84% | 32% | 36% | 59% | 23% | 73% | 18% | 38% | 56% | 49% | 50% | 33% |
130% or more: wet month 70% or less: dry month
Caves nearby.
Grottes de Cougnac
France
- —Depth
- —Galleries
- 211 mEntrance altitude
- 12 °CInside, all year
Font-de-Gaume cave
France · 34 km
- —Depth
- —Galleries
- 91 mEntrance altitude
- 13 °CInside, all year
Les Combarelles
France · 33 km
- —Depth
- —Galleries
- 106 mEntrance altitude
- 13 °CInside, all year
Where these figures come from
| Name, type, published depth and length, visitors | Wikidata (Q1999693) · CC0 |
|---|---|
| The relief above, the entrance altitude, the section and the 3D model | Copernicus DEM GLO-30 · © DLR e.V., © Airbus Defence and Space GmbH, Copernicus/ESA |
| Climate | NASA POWER, 1991–2020 |
| Entrances, springs, sinkholes, opening hours and what is around | © OpenStreetMap contributors · ODbL |
| Images | EOX Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 · CC BY 4.0; Wikimedia Commons |
Every figure is an average, an estimate or a count from a public dataset. Licences and methods: data sources.
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