History | Le Mineur Paysan

The Origins

Le mineur paysan is Victor.
Like thousands of other farmers at the beginning of the 20th century, Victor traded the straw hat and the farmer's hoe for the helmet and pickaxe of the coal miner. At that time, the Decazeville mine was booming, and despite the risks and the hardship of the work, farmers often favored mining over agriculture out of financial necessity.
Nearly 100 years later, in April 2013, Christian Lacombe, Victor's grandson, paid tribute to his grandfather and to the memory of all the mineurs paysans of the Decazeville basin by giving this name to the pilgrim lodge he had just inaugurated.
In doing so, he hoped to keep alive the memory of an era, at a time when things are often forgotten very quickly….

The Creation

Christian Lacombe is a stonemason, like his younger brother. Together, they bring an old abandoned barn back to life on the Camino de Compostela route.
Committed to ecology and careful not to alter the original spirit of the building, the two brothers undertake a renovation using traditional techniques and materials, mainly stone, wood and lime.
Then the lodge under construction becomes an "ecolodge" with the installation of solar thermal heating and dry toilets.
The 70 cm thick walls keep the interior cool during the hottest months, while the exposed stone and beams help make this place warm and welcoming, where you simply feel good…

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The Handover

In 2025, Christian and Betty, soon-to-be young retirees, decide to take a new turn. Christian, a builder one day, a builder forever, has new construction projects. As for Betty, after 20 years of night work as a nursing assistant, she aspires to return to a "normal" life. So they look for someone to take over the ecolodge.
At the same time, an engineer in the automotive industry leaves his job in Stuttgart, Germany, and looks for a career change, a return to France, and… a greener life.
Chance, or rather Providence, takes care of the rest, and in August 2026, Morgane, Marc and Naguiv become the new owners of Le Mineur Paysan.
As a little side note: that engineer, who graduated from the Ecole des Mines in Nantes a long time ago, was therefore a "mineur" by training. From mineur, he will now become paysan… and the circle is complete.