We stopped at the Grotto Gaume, two star, and Paul even decided to go in (he hates caves) since there were cave drawings present. However, after quite a wait we got to the head of the line and discovered that even though the ticket office had only been open for only 30 minutes the tickets were already up to 1 pm. We decided it was too late, we would never finish the day if we didn't leave here until after 2 pm. So no cave this morning :(
We followed the road out of town and up another hill, quite a long one and a lot of traffic. Now as it happens, fortunately for Paul, I didn't notice the turn off for a route which would go up a quiet white road. It was fortunate for Paul because only a few K's further on there was a Goose farm where they gave demonstrations of the goose force feeding. I think it is kind of disgusting and I didn't want to see it but it turns out the demo was in only 20 minutes so there was no way Paul was going to pass that up. The farmer came out in due course, gave a long speech about the geese. As far as I could ascertain the babies were about 8 weeks, the middle size ones 17 weeks and the larger ones older. He then took us into the feeding shed where there were two groups of four geese. It was interesting the way they behaved. Outside they all flock around the farmer as he feeds them. Inside they run from him squawking. Paul assures me that they feel nothing from the process but I don't think so. The farmer gabbled on for a long time and then fortunately we could leave. All I got out of his speech was that they get 17 days of one type of food and 17 days of a corn like feed.
We finally left there and this time I did see the turn off for the next quiet route which also turned out to be fortunate. Just a K or two along there was Le Roque St. Christophe. This is the location of an old fortress built into the rock face. The first fortress, really rock face town, was around the 14th century. However the site has been almost continuously inhabited for the last 55,000 years! The rock face town is gone however they have recreated sections of it and there was even a printed English guide. They also had working replicas of various different winches that were used at the time to get food and materials up from the valley floor. It was actually a very good site.
We were peckish so we polished off a patisserie we had from breakfast and then rode the 5 K's to St Leon sur Vezere. This is also a one star town and quite pretty, although not very big. We checked out the restaurants, almost accepted a mediocre looking one, when we saw a sign for a garden restaurant. We went there of course, a very nice setting and the food was excellent. I am pretty sick of duck and goose by now so we had something completely different: A vegetarian terrine (yes Lynda it's true), a vegetarian assortment for the main, including a lovely potato dish, with two medallions of chicken. Ha Ha, fooled you. And dessert was a Tart Belle Helene, basically a lemon meringue pie. Delicious, bloated we left around 3 pm. Fortunately it is not as hot today.
Then the final 10 K's to Montignac where the Lascaux Caves are. Of course we have no hope of seeing them now, it is just too late in the afternoon. So it looks like it will have to be another time. The final stretch of the ride, after the obligatory hill was along the side of the river Vezere. We've actually been along the river all day but this is the first time that they've bothered to put the road along side instead of in the cliffs up above. There was a nice little chateau along the way, open to the public too, but it was on the other side of the road, so we got a photo but that was all.
Finally reaching town we circled once looking for the hotel that Paul had picked and then found it. We checked in, they only do demi-pensions. This is where there is a fixed price for accommodation, breakfast and dinner all in one, in this case 120 Euro. It seemed a little steep but we were planning to have dinner there anyway (we'd already checked the menu) and tomorrow is a semi-rest day so it would be nice to have a proper breakfast, so we did.
After showering, I started the hard work on the diary. I am so far behind and Paul has taken so many pictures it is going to take ages to catch up :( Around 6pm Paul insisted we go for a walk and just as we were leaving Paul found the two pain au raison that we bought for breakfast and forgot about. He ate his but I just nibbled at mine, mainly the raisins, and fed the rest to the ducks. Quite fun. There was a mini Paul duckling, it grabbed as much as it could and wouldn't share no matter how big the other duck was!
The town itself is quite nice, not that touristy. The church is 1930's and of course by now most of the shops were shut. Still we had a nice walk, Paul took too many photos again, and we got back to the hotel around 8pm for dinner. After a quick wash we went down and we were one of the last ones to arrive. Dinner was in the garden out the back of the hotel and there was almost a cool breeze blowing. There is a change coming in and it is supposed to be 24C tomorrow, a nice change. The demi-pension includes the 24 Euro menu, which we'd picked earlier. It was mainly regional specialities but I managed to avoid duck altogether, Paul however couldn't help himself and had duck gizzard salad and confit of duck. I had red mullet with salad, which included a rather nice tomato sorbet, and then I had steak which was outstanding, so very much better than the other day at the Bellevue hotel. Of course the wine was just a glass of the local red and was not too exciting. For dessert I had what turned out to be another lemon meringue tart!
One interesting thing about the hotel is the number of English tourists here. We can't remember the last hotel where there were any and this hotel is almost completely full of them. Funnily enough some of them are exactly the stereotypical English tourists, not a word of French, they even had to ask what the word for water was!
No comments:
Post a Comment