Carcans en Plage to Bordeaux

Yesterday was a beach day. Not too much to report so I took a day off blogging. We sat on the beach for much of the day and if we did that at home we would be burnt to a crisp. Not here though and many people don’t cover up not even kids. 

Surf school for the young ones, starts early in the morning. 

We had a nice bbq dinner and then said au revoir to Chris and Karen. They decided to leave in the morning at 4am and I think they got home about 4pm. Whew long day. 

We didn’t hear them leave and it was nearly 8 when we woke. We packed up and got on the road, we stopped for a coffee along the way but only about a 75km journey today. 

The bridge coming into Bordeaux. 

Luckily when we arrived at our hotel they had a room available so we were able to check in straight away. There is a supermarket and boulangerie right next door so we headed there to get a few things for a light lunch. The self checkout looked a bit intimidating so we queued up at the manned one. This proved to be a big bonus. The young checkout girl asked us where we were from and enthused she would love to visit as she is a massive Lord of the Rings fan. We exchanged pleasantries and then on the back of the docket she wrote down two restaurants and a wine bar for us to visit. 

Anyway after lunch we crossed a bridge over the very wide Garonne river into the old town.

 A mass of people wandering around the shops. Very cool old town with many shops from high end to low end and everything in between. 

Some streets are narrow some are wide, mostly cobbled and lovely old buildings about 3-4 stories high. Mainly apartments on the upper floors. 

At some intersections are little squares full of cafes and bars. Fantastic atmosphere. By about 4 we were done so we headed back to our hotel. 


The Grosse cloche - the only remaining part of the 13 th century defensive gate. The bell weighs 7800 kgs. 

We booked into one of the recommended restaurants, The Maillard. 

Authentic French food and wines from Bordeaux. Lovely. We were pretty full when we emerged a couple of hours later. 




We then wandered along the embankment the place buzzing with entertainment and people doing much as we were. A nice atmosphere with bars spilling across the pavement and people just everywhere, lots of families, not so many oldies like us. We then wandered the half hour back to the hotel and called it a night. 


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

St Claude to Manigod

Image
 Only around 140km today but very very windy on our chosen route. Today we wind up into the foot hills of the French alps where we will spend a few days. Chris and Karen have hired a house here and have kindly invited us to stay.  The terrain is lovely very reminiscent of Switzerland which I guess is hardly surprising as we are close to the border. Lovely forests and pretty green meadows.  All the little villages are out of story books and are kept in absolutely pristine condition.  We passed a lookout through to the big mountains and there was a sign board depicting and naming them including the famous Mt Blanc. Unfortunately for us they were all obscured in what appears to a heat haze.It is very hot up here with temperatures into the low 30’s. A little later we did see some outlines through the haze and they are big mountains.   We watched the weather on TV last night and there is another heatwave imminent. Some areas, in fact most areas will experience high 3...
Read more

Dinan to Mont St Michel

Image
 Another grey day and threatening rain. We only have a short distance to go and we only had a bit of drizzle until we got near our destination and then it hosed down.  We were too early to check into our hotel but we could park in the hotel carpark and leave gear in the lobby.  We have arrived at probably the 2nd most photographed place in France behind the Eiffel Tower.  Mont Saint Michel is an icon. Of course there are tourists everywhere but for good reason, this place is epic.  We jumped on the free shuttle bus which traverses a causeway out to the island. The weather had fined up and the tide was out so we could wander around the island to get different perspectives and to truly appreciate the scale of this place.   We then entered the compoumd and meandered up and up and joined a queue to get tickets into the abbey proper. We opted to get the audio guide as well which was well worthwhile.  The design and engineering of the abbey is off the s...
Read more

Kassel to Celle

Image
 A lovely day today. The weather is pleasant and our journey has also been very pleasant without being spectacular. Much like yesterday really, many lovely farming villages and perfect back country roads meandering through rolling farmlands and woodland forests. For several km the road was lined with lovely oak trees, very nice until I considered the possibility of having to take evasive action at some point……I stopped thinking about it then.  Our destination is the town of Celle which we didn’t know too much about but it is a gem. After checking into our hotel we walked through a lovely park into the old town.   We visited the palace dated back to the 12 th century. It is now a really beautiful museum.  There are many pieces of period furniture in place and some of the cabinets amd bureaus have staggeringly beautiful inlaid wood patterns. The last permanent resident of this palace was Caroline Matilda the sister of King George III.  She married the Danish king ...
Read more