Puy du Fou is Great Fun for All Ages

Puy du Fou was one of the main excursions our French immersion class from Angers participated in. Puy du Fou is a theme park in the Vendée Department of western France. There are historical shows in the evening and by day you can visit three separate areas: a medieval city, 18th century village and a 1900s town square.

Puy du Fou Cinéscénie

The show that we saw is called a Cinéscénie and takes place behind the ruins of the castle near the village of Les Epesses.  In 1978 they produced the first show.  The theme park arrived in 1989.

The scene as the sun sets.

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Since we were only going to the evening show and not the park, we arrived at 10pm. The Grand Park Puy du Fou has an enormous arena spread over 23 hectares with a lake in the center of the arena. This was the most spectacular show I have ever seen.

Approximately 1200 locals produce the show here. Their intent is to keep the history of the area alive. It is pretty unbelievable!

A new section of the park opened this year (2012). In the garden of Jean de la Fontaine, children interact with all of the animal characters that appear in Fontaine’s fables such as The Grasshopper and the Ant and The Crow and the Fox.

The video which follows is about 8 minutes long and I wish it were longer. I shot various parts of the show, including fireworks. However, I included none of the parts with speaking as it took all my concentration to understand the spoken French! Our seats were located about 2/3 of the way up in the stands. Think professional football stadium and you have a good idea of the height from which I filmed.