Our first view of the Pyrenees in the distance as we approached the town of Gan. The Aire was in the corner of a car-park and next to a quiet stream and free.
Just over the Road was the Cave De Gan Jurançon (https://www.cavedejurancon.com). The tour was free and included tasting of their wonderful produce. It was a very quiet afternoon and our tour guide gave us a personal service!
They specialise in sweet wines and they told us are almost unknown outside France although they sell over four million bottles a year. Very interesting is that the grapes largely press themselves – 85% of the juice is extracted just by putting the grapes in huge 3 story tall vats – this is the equivalent of a 15 ton press.
The wine was wonderful and we bought two bottles for the ‘cellar’ including one that is aged in oak barrels. They use new oak – guess what happens to the oak afterwards – yep – whisky barrels!
We did a cycle tour of the town but it didn’t take too long! Dinner by the river and surrounded by ducks.
10 km from plage, and a different world. There are two large inland lakes and it’s back to a similar climate to La Rochelle and the Ile de Re. A 10 km cycle ride to do a grocery shop and that’s it for the day!
Next morning and it’s a walk around the town, and in the afternoon a visit to the Musee Hydravation – the seaplane museum. We whiled away a couple of hours there.
We have let the planning get away from us a bit so we spent the evening planning out our next week and doing housekeeping and maintenance chores. Obligatory church visit fitted in too.
Biscarrosse Lac. It’s sad when someones pride and joy (and an expensive toy) gets abandoned like this. It makes you wonder what the story is. (Oooo and it makes me wonder).
Church at Biscarrosse Lac
Musee Hydravation at Biscarrosse Lac
Musee Hydravation at Biscarrosse Lac. Wonder if we can recommend these seating arrangements to Easyjet?
Musee Hydravation at Biscarrosse Lac. Shorts Sunderland: amazing plane.
We intended to visit the famous dunes of Pyla and stop overnight, but discovered that the Aire de camping car has been closed (never mind missing the meter like Fouras) and all roads nearby had signs specifically barring overnight parking in camping cars.
So a flying trip up and down the dunes (and a ripoff 8€ parking for two hours) and then on our way. If you use the official car park, there are dedicated areas for camping cars, but they are tight squeeze between the trees, very tight!
The dunes are amazing, over 100M tall and overlooking a sandy bay on one side and thousands of hectares of green pine forests inland. T had intended to do a drone photo here, but the overnight stop put paid to that. Actually, it turns out that the dunes are within a French drone exclusion area, so it was a no-go on the drone anyway!
On then to Biscarrosse, 20km down the coast from the dunes and finally to the Atlantic proper. The aire de camping car is 5 minutes over the sand dunes to the sea and there is no protected inlet or harbour here, just the Atlantic washing against the coast.
Sea spray caused a sea mist and gave a moody atmosphere to an 8km walk along the beach. At night Sporadic rain, but a beautiful bright morning.
A wander into the town and it was obvious that we were in tourist central. So instead we cycled to the outskirts of the inland Lake and it was beautiful and had its own aire, so we hightailed it back to Mothership and set off for Biscarrosse Lac.
Resting on top of the Dunes of Pyla, watching the paragliders
Resting on top of the Dunes of Pyla, watching the other people walking up. This is a great shot to get the scale of the dunes!
A walk along the beach at Biscarrosse Plage
Moody shot at Biscarrosse Plage
Mothership nestled among the trees at Biscarrosse Plage
A great big bridge (8€ toll) takes you from the mainland just north of La Rochelle onto the 35km Island of the Ile de Ré. It is a cycling heaven! The cycle paths are mostly tarmac and are separate from the highway. We thought Coulon was great for cycling but the Ile de Ré takes the prize.
We stayed for two nights at the northern end of the island and cycled between the main tourist attractions such as the Phare des Baleines lighthous and larger towns. 50km cycled in all. Much of the island is very low lying and is given to salt production, oyster beds and mussel farms. It was wonderful to cycle amongst it all!
A heavy downpour on the second night and that has been pretty much the first rain we’ve seen since leaving home! T got to play with the drone over the sea and some WWII emplacements.
We had a chuckle with a British couple in the aire – they asked how long we were travelling and when Selina said that we are planning on a year away they told us that they managed ten weeks once just after they retired and had nearly killed each other. We’ll have to watch out for the ten week itch!
Ile de Ré. Typical streets in the villages on the island.
Ile de Ré – we think these are disused oyster beds, now a wildlife sanctuary.
Ile de Ré – Salt beds. There is salt for sale everywhere on the island.
Ile de Ré and a view of the Phare des Baleines
Ile de Ré and a view from the Phare des Baleines
Ile de Ré and a view from the Phare des Baleines
Ile de Ré and a standard tourist photo down the stairs at the lighthouse Phare des Baleines
We moved down the coast a little to Fouras, where we discovered that someone had taken away the parking meter for the aire de camping car, so we get a night for free! We walked 5 km along the coast and checked out the town. It turned out that Fouras holds an annual windsurfing race around fort Boyard and it was the following day, so that’s us sorted then!
The other thing that Fouras is known for is it’s shallow sandy bay. This means that there are oyster beds all over than place that are tended to at low tide and also a walkway to fort Enet 2km in the bay that is also only exposed at low tide.
T checked the tide table and determined that we needed to depart at 10AM the next day so it was wine and pasta for dins and a movie. At the anointed time the next day we cycled around the bay and set out with the oyster-men for the fort. Late September so the tourist population was thin. All the time we were walking to the fort and our main concern was making sure that there was someone further out to sea than us as we were not sure how long we would have to beat the tide. But we had them about spot on and we got to the fort and wandered around and looked across to Fort Boyard (yes, that fort Boyard)
There are various boat trips out to Boyard from Fouras and also from La Rochelle and other seaside towns in the area. But the boat trips are expensive at 30€ plus each and you can’t even get off and see the fort, so we could not quite justify it. Instead, from fort Enet, you can just about see the fort in the photos. It’s in private ownership, so there are no tours anyway.
And then a brisk walk back to the mainland and around the bay to Fouras beach and watched the preparations for the Fort Boyard Challenge. We didn’t get to see the main event but the warm-ups were pretty cool.
Fishing huts at Fouras
Fouras
View of the private gardens backing onto the sea in the posh part of Fouras
A few wonderful days in La Rochelle. We stayed in the Port Neuf area, which is to the west of the town. We found a cracking site for about 10€ a day including electrical hookup. We got set up and got the bikes out. The first evening was punctuated by the sounds of rugby – the stadium was nearby and there was a big game on!
Day one we mooched around, we did a circuit of the harbour – no mean feat, it’s about 20 km in all. Looking across the harbour, there is a massive sea of masts, there must be a thousand boats at least. Day two we we visited the Maritime museum, the famous towers, the aquarium and a few other things too. It was clear that two days does not allow enough time to do justice to the wonderful town so it became a four day mini adventure in all.
The maritime museum has a meteorological research ship, a trawler and a tugboat to look around plus a whole bunch of land based artefacts celebrating La Rochelle and her most famous maritime sons and daughters.
We expected the aquarium to be a bit of a tourist trap but ended up spending a few hours looking a various denizens of the deep. They have a couple of grey sharks and one highlight was walking on a rope bridge over a tank of piranha.
Over the few days we also fitted in the F1 Grand Prix. We worked our way around a french launderette (losing 4€ in the process) and we even had a meal in a restaurant: Moules frites for T and a burger for S. When we planned the big adventure we agreed that restaurant meals are a treat and not the norm!
One trip that T dad recommended was a boat trip to Ile de Ré. The boat will take bikes, but the timings in late September didn’t really work for us and it was pretty expensive, so that’s our next stop – rather than visiting by boat we’ll visit via mothership!
La Rochelle – the classic photo of the entrance to the old harbour.
La Rochelle – the harbour is absolutely massive.
La Rochelle – the harbour is absolutely massive.
La Rochelle maritime museum – Selina is bloody riveted as we examine the engine room of the research vessel
La Rochelle maritime museum – its important to get those screw heads all lined up!
La Rochelle. Having a late lunch on the research vessel in the maritime museum, we watch a yacht being put in the water for the very first time – it’s quite moving!
La Rochelle – an evening meal of moules et frites. It’s very important to keep the detritus looking neat and the waitress was impressed. First and only smile we got out of her.
La Rochelle Aquarium
La Rochelle Aquarium. Jellyfish!
La Rochelle. Moody Sky
La Rochelle. Mothership Satellite dish cleared the trees by about 2cm
The site was camping Port de Neuf: 6 Boulevard Aristide Rondeau, 17000 La Rochelle
The area around Coulon has has the nickname of ‘Green Venice’. There are hundreds of km of canals originally dug to help drain and farm marshland. It’s possible to rent canoes, kayaks, punts, and electric boats, but we opted to splash out €1.50 on a ‘Carte Velo’ and cycle around the area. Selina was game and did 50km having not been on a bicycle for 40 years.
Next stop is La Rochelle – we do like to be beside the seaside!
Coulon – Selina on a bike for pretty much the first time in 40 years.
Coulon
Coulon – view down the main river.
Coulon – cycle paths around ‘green Venice’.
Coulon – This bridge reminds us of a famous one in France. erm I forget…
Coulon – we looked nervously along the railways lines at this unmarked crossing, but there was nothing to worry about!
We left St Amand Magnazeix about midday as we spent about two hours working with the layout of the bikes on the rack (yes, it’s a tough life) – but we do now have a rear view from the camera – thanks to Toby’s dad!
Our first bit of péage as the section of the A10 from Poitiers to Niort cost 14€. Normally we will avoid toll roads, but today it suited us to get to Niort and get sorted.
A quick trip to the Tourist Information Office and we know what the town has to offer. An uneventful evening, Selina made some headway in the ‘European Scrabble Challenge’. Scottish smoked salmon in the van and the Gendarmerie came by at 9:15 in the morning collecting the site fees.
Wandering around plus visits to museums and churches the following day and a huge omelette in the van for dinner. Friday we head over in the direction of La Rochelle taking in ‘Green Venice’ on the way.
A great chance to catch up with Toby’s dad and unwind. Not that we had anything to unwind from, but it was great to be chilled out for a week. We took the Kayak on the lake, we cycled about 80km during the week and we even got a drone shot of the Mothership. We also reminded ourselves that we are rubbish at ten pin bowling!
Limousin is very brown at the moment – the area has been very short of rain this year. Just a couple of pictures to show of the week. We went out for a few meals: of special mention, the Restaurant Le viaduc at Busseau-Sur-Creuse: www.restaurant-leviaduc.com We had a wonderful meal and an awesome view of the 1863 built viaduct.
The Viaduct
The Viaduct
St Amand Magnazeix – Mothership at rest.
St Amand Magnazeix – Toby with a chicken on his head.
St Amand Magnazeix sunset
Toby playing on the lake at Bessines. Toby bought a lot of toys with him – the garage is full!
Parthenay is close to Poitiers and on the banks of the Thouet. The aire for the night was ten euros which included electrical hookup and toilet. Like many aires, this one is associated with a nice campsite. You can stay in the campsite proper and use all the facilities, showers, swimming pool, etc and pay twenty euros, or stay in a simple spot and get access to none of the facilities for considerably less. In the morning they provided us a code to get into the campsite to use the motor-home servicing point and then we were on our way. Aside from enjoying the wonderful view of the Thouet and the lake, we didn’t get to see Parthenay! — in Parthenay.
