Up The Atlantic Coast

June 2nd 2003

Hello UK residents! Welcome to the next leg of our journey... After our morning exploring Bordeaux, we headed for the tourist office, to board our coach bound for St. Emillion and to the Chateaux Cantin. After a short but factual journey (courtesey of our French to English translator), we arrived at the beautiful picturesque Chateaux Cantin. We were bundled along in a tourist-group fashion, and guided through the vineyards, cellars and vats, and barrel storage aging areas. After this, we got the opportunity to sample the 'fruits of our labour' ;) The wines from this region are red, and Cabernet-Sauvignon and Merlot... and tasted very rich! After some taught-quaffing, we were already having 'whooshes of oak' up our nostrils! After leaving the Chateaux, our coach headed to Saint Emillion. This small village provided a great stop-break from the many large towns and cities that we had recently been travelling between. The village was small but beautifully cobbled as we wound our way through it, soaking up the sun. The local speciality caught us unawares at the top of a steep climb to the 'summit' of the village - these maccaroons were divine! Next day, we headed to the coast to the bay of Arcachon. On arrival we hit the beach nice and early, and stayed there until lunchtime when we hunted down some lunch in the form of two huge Niçois baps!! After this, the weather was hitting mid thirties so we retreated to the beach and cooled off in the icey Atlantic. At 2pm, we jumped aboard a boat which took us on a two hour tour around the bay. We welcomed greatly the sea breezes! The boat took us firstly past the Isles de Oiseaux (island of birds), past several luscious villages, where the boundaries between forest and ocean began to blend seemlessly in this delightful area. Then we were taken past the Sand Dune Pyla (or Pilat) - at 130 metres high, being the tallest in Europe! After 2 hours at sea, we returned to Arcachon, and after tea we caught a train back to Bordeaux. Our last day in the Bordeaux region and we chose to head inland to the small town of Bergerac. It was a pleasure to wonder the streets here; and relax in several of the fountained squares. We headed back, ready to leave the following morning! Today our adventure took us too Saintes, further north. The weather today was just as hot, and we used this afternoon to explore the town. We first headed to the impressive out of town Roman Ampitheatre, followed by getting briefly lost, and then exploring what the town had to offer. Saintes, altohugh nice enough, was not a patch on Bergerac or St. Emillion where we had just come from. However, Hotel Au Terminus is very cosy and we have our own sofa to watch TV on after a hard day travelling ;) Second day in Saintes, and we headed to Cognac... and soon wished we had not! Being a Sunday, everything was neglected and shut down, and we soon became bored so headed back to the station only to find that, to our dismay, there was no train until 17:30! So we took the next train available to Angouléme, an equally exciting place! We finally got back to Saintes after a totally wasted day. And chilled out with a bottle of wine. Sadly, today is very similar in that the weather has got the better of our beach day in Royan. The beaches look nice, but we cant use them because its too cold here! The town has nothing to offer either, so we plan to take an early train home. (home that is too Saintes; not Huntingdon, sorry guys!) Maybe are expectations were just too high after all the great places we have been to, but these places have seemed nothing much however we have been enjoying eachothers company instead :) We are excited about going to La Rochelle tomorrow for a couple of days, however the weather looks to be off... so maybe no beach day after all? humm, this weather is stubborn! We shall be going now, trains to catch and all! Ciao Katie. xx

Listed by : Katie

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