Blogs from La Rochelle, Poitou-Charentes, France, Europe - page 5

Well, I seem to heave survived my first few weeks with no major disasters - on a french course at present but its all coming along very slowly. Will hopefully improve as the year goes on. Anyway a few pics below of where I'm living and some sailing pics from various days training....... read more

I thought that having given up work on 21st July I would have no more early mornings so it was with some shock that I received the information from Matt's parents that the wake up call to head for France would be at 4.30am! .......a time I was sure only happened once a day. Having arrived at the house some 12 hours after the wake up call we were greeted by a lovely blue sky, this was not to continue the following day was fairly grey and wet but good weather has prevailed since then (but for a few chillier days). The main trauma in France was the lack of web, Winn and Maurice's internet was being upgraded and we had to wait for their pal and personal IT Manager to arrive and fix it. I ... read more

Mont St Michel Our first visit was Mont St Michel. Traveling by road its hard to miss, a huge abbey covers the summit and is lined with various buildings of different architectural designs. This place is very commercial but and amazing site to admire. Apparently Mont St Michel is one area that is renowned for the surrounding tides, the difference from low and high tide is approx 15m. St Marlo We have now moved into the province of Brittany. St Marlo has an amazing stone walled city that was originally an island. Like so many places of historical value 80% of St Marlo was trashed during 1944 battle to drive out the German forces. The main historical monuments have been restored to their former glory. The streets are so narrow with cobble stone pavement - It ... read more

With some sun finally breaking through I took a trip out to the Ile de Re. As the bus curves over the bridge to the island the whole of the bay is laid out below, big ships at anchor, the Lavardin Tower light seemingly directly below and 5 or 6 miles to the south the big square block of Fort Boyard (unfortunately no sign of Melinda Messenger or Lesley Grantham...) between the flat, tree-lined Iles d'Aix and d'Oleron. A small tour of the island follows giving if othing else an appreciation of how much prettier St Martin (my destination) is compared to the rest of the rather functional holiday-home-esque villages on Re. It seems the past inhabitants of St Martin didn't get on with outside world too well. The town is surrounded by huge defensive walls ... read more

Egg #2. It's me again, with a little update from La Rochelle, on the West coast of France about half way up. Unfortunately I don’t have any near death experiences to tell you about this time, but I’ll do my best to make something up if I feel that its getting a bit tame. La Rochelle is a med sized harbour town. How to describe La Rochelle?……. I’d say: nautical, fresh, pretty, well maintained, sunny, pleasant, nautical, white, nautical, bright, breezy, nautical. And just erring slightly on the side of ‘retirement home’. So, what’s with the nautical malarky? (readers voice). Well, to say that Portland Bill and Captain Pugwash probably went to school here could be the understatement of the year. There’s a port here called ‘Les Minimes’ ……… more like ‘Les Maximes’ - there’s at ... read more