Advertisement
Well, I think we’ve been being at least a bit more like tourists and less like lazy aristocrats as of late, though I say this even as the scent of our second to last dinner prepared by Alain is wafting into the game room here where I’m writing.
Three days ago we drove to Pau, which is a city of about half a million people situated about an hour and a half’s drive southwest of the chateau. We did not have a whole lot of time since we ended up leaving kind of late, so we mostly just saw the moderately famous Chateau de Pau and had lunch. The Chateau itself was pretty neat, aside from the fact that it had to be seen in a guided tour that was kind of bothersome both because it is nice to go at one’s own pace and because the tour was given in French. The place was the site of all kinds of royal comings and goings, most notably for the birth of Henry IV in 1553. The turtle shell that was his cradle was on display, along with dozens of detailed tapestries and furniture. It was quite the architectural feature,
but for one reason or another I did not really feel like I connected with the place. Perhaps my lack of interest in all the history made it less interesting, since the only event that jumped out at me was the fact that the Chateau was, for a couple of years, the prison of the emir Abd-El Kadr, who was a prominent figure in the Algerian revolutionary war. It was nice to get out a little bit though.
I was however, struck by the architecture at our next destination, Bordeaux. Bordeaux is a city of almost 1 million people, which would make it the second largest city in southern France next to Marseilles. One point about France is that the majority of the country is very rural and very agrarian. Something like twenty percent of the population lives in Paris, so the rest of the country is relatively empty by comparison. When we drive to these destinations, there are just miles upon miles of alternating forests and farmland. It’s obvious that the entire landscape has been planned at one point or another. All of the forests are in various stages of production, with some of them bare from a
recent harvest, some recently planted saplings, and others relatively mature. It may be empty, but it’s definitely not wild. Anyway, we had pizza for lunch, which was served with an egg on top. Then, after listening to this strange and mediocre English band play in the main square, we visited Saint Andre’s cathedral. This turned out to be my first time inside one of these churches, and no amount of slides and travel shows really prepared me for the experience. It was constructed in the 15th century and rises to a height of 50 meters (164 feet). Imagine what a sight the place would have been to 15th century eyes! No wonder they were so religious: the cathedral alone was probably all they needed to bring peasants to their knees. After wandering around for a while and gaping at the impossible arches, we climbed the circular stone staircase to the top of the adjacent bell tower, which was built at the same time as the cathedral. Looking out on all of Bordeaux from the top of that tower was the highlight of the day. For some reason it was very satisfying to see the whole of city, perhaps because the
topography and the crowded narrow streets otherwise seldom affords that kind of view, especially in French cities.
Yesterday we drove a couple hours south to the Pyrenees for a hike, which also satisfied my thirst for some vertical. The place we hiked was about felt so much like the Alps that I found myself humming Sound of Music tunes. It really was complete with cows and sheep with bells on their necks and soft green turf broken up by forests and peaks rounded by time, as if someone had gone over the whole place with sandpaper. Much to Christine’s (Mike’s half sister) chagrin, there were also large horses grazing that were destined for a place next to the chicken and beef at the supermarket. Apparently horse is somewhat of an acquired taste. After a short hike, we had sandwiches and drove to another little mountain town for coffee, where Mat and Mike bought some wild boar sausage and local wine, which we had with Alain’s onion soup and Moroccan entrée. To your credit Jeremy, your onion soup blew his away. Then we drove up to the ski resort and to the top of the range, which happened to be
the route Tour de France takes every year. Though we passed a number of bikers, it didn’t look like they were having a whole lot of fun. We took some pictures at the top, played with some puppies that happened to be wandering around, and drove back to the chateau.
We will be leaving the chateau here pretty soon. We’re going to have dinner at a nice restaurant tonight, and then probably head out tomorrow at some point. Mike is flying back to Los Angeles for a doctor’s appointment, so Mat and I are going to travel around Spain for a week or so and then we will try to meet at the castle in Ireland on the 10th or so. We are going to try to find a Spanish travel guide today so we can figure out what we want to do and how we’re going to do it. I would like to try to get down to Grenada to the Alhambra, but that might be too ambitious for a week long trip. I hope you are all well.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.12s; Tpl: 0.014s; cc: 11; qc: 48; dbt: 0.0794s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.2mb
kimberly
non-member comment
haha, random garden...eloquent.