<story><title>Guédelon Castle</title><url>https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gu%C3%A9delon_Castle</url></story><parent_chain></parent_chain><comment><author>pianoben</author><text>This reminds me of a road trip I took with a girlfriend in 2010 or so.  We drove south out of St. Louis, MO, going nowhere in particular, and ended up near the Arkansas border.  I could have sworn I was dreaming, but nearby there was a bona-fide 13th-century French castle under construction, using period-appropriate tools and techniques, in the middle of the Ozarks!&lt;p&gt;It was absolutely surreal.  There was a working farm to grow food for the laborers, stone was sourced from a nearby quarry, there was a smithy on-site, and even some tools were original to the period and were imported from France.&lt;p&gt;Just looked it up - I guess it closed down.  Too bad, but maybe unsurprising: &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.onlyinyourstate.com&amp;#x2F;arkansas&amp;#x2F;ar-ozark-medieval-fortress-remnants&amp;#x2F;&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.onlyinyourstate.com&amp;#x2F;arkansas&amp;#x2F;ar-ozark-medieval-f...&lt;/a&gt;</text></comment>
<story><title>Guédelon Castle</title><url>https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gu%C3%A9delon_Castle</url></story><parent_chain></parent_chain><comment><author>loufe</author><text>Indeed! I just went and volunteered last year (first trip to Europe)! You can do a 7 day rotating internship with them (provided you have a good base in french). They really let you do almost everything, I worked in masonry, carpentry, tile making, grout making, etc. They are a great group and the project is really cool, I made a bunch of friends during my time there too. I strongly recommend the experience.</text></comment>