FRANCE 2

Carnac and indeed the Morbihan Coast has been such a beautiful surprise.  We spent one whole, long day trekking many kilometres around Megalithic sites of remarkable size…..we stumbled ( at times literally) upon sacred wells hidden in undergrowth and crawled through Burial mounds to discover interesting pagan carvings… many of which were replicated on old stone churches built upon much older sacred sites……after rain the previous day it was muddy work!! But it was the clear pristine Brittany air, the soft grasses and wild flowers swaying in the breeze and the sense that we were walking, sitting, musing with the old Gods present that made this a most wonderful day!!

Then we sat on a wild long stretch of gritty Brittany sand (Le Grand plage) and Mike sketched while I meditated……alone apart from two intrepid surfers…..

At night we feasted on the oversized everything served in Britanny……from the half litre pots of beer to the mugs of coffee you could bathe in, to the “small” pizzas that were as big as a large pizza Aussie style and gallettes filled with egg and cheese that draped themselves over the plate edges…..( come to think of it just as well we walked so much………)

Our two nights in Carnac were very special and we were once again loathe to leave but excited for the next leg of our journey!

If only we had known……..hubris was about to hit as we patted ourselves on the back for how easy we had found driving in France until now!  Half way to Bordeaux we hit a “deviation” or detour and somehow lost touch with any roads that were marked on my map!! We took a winding route through vast tracks of central France on tiny roads and through little towns with too many one way streets that were more than breath in moments!! And added a nice wo hours to our journey, a few expletives to our language and some very interesting moments to my inevitable “je suis perdue, je voudrais Bordeaux”  …thanks to much furious signing and waving of hands, some laughter and sharing of poor French and strange English we were helped on our way and eventually found St Emilion just out of Bordeaux which was we were told near to our stay in  a Chateaux on a winery……..again we needed directions and this time due to impossibly complicated and windy streets and my blank stares we were guided by a wonderful French lady who simply in the end said “ah, mon diue follow me….Tout allors tout allors”….. and then we landed on our feet in the most scenic and beautiful of spots I have ever had the pleasure of experiencing! The wine was waiting in the fridge, the key in the door and a note…’Mr Murray let yourself in, help yourself….see you for a winery tour at 11am J’  …….we ate the best French pastries, little flans of cheese and courgettes and a custard tart to die for and drank wine…more than necessary but very welcome after our trying, nay interesting day!!

In the  morning refreshed and sated by this extraordinary place, its silence, its wide skies and rows of rolling hills filled with grapevines, we found out that Chateau Valendraud is one of the best wineries in the Bordeaux region, we tasted, bought and then explored its nearby village of St Emillon, giving me a few more grey hairs as I climbed to the top of the old Kings keep which was higher than I liked, windier that you can imagine, tighter than is comfortable and so scary that I embarrassingly came down mostly on ,my bum.........phew……