Blaye Citadelle, Fest Arts and St Emilion! (9 & 10 August)
by samThursday morning out of Brach (we stayed at an Aire Naturelle which I think means a campsite but with more basic facilities and a bit more room for your tent) and onto the ferry to Blaye. On-board the ferry we met some other British cyclists (Nick and Irene on a tandem and Chris and Janice on solo bikes…….hey, so did I get your names correct?!) who had been doing a tour of the Dordogne for a couple of weeks. We were so engrossed in tandem-talk we almost didn’t get off the ferry.
We stopped in Blaye Citadelle which has had a fort on it since Roman times and then has been rebuilt over the centuries, and the walls lowered drastically in the 18th century when they started using canons. Good place to have breakfast and apparently also to collecty blood. We got talking to the people taking blood donations who very kindly tried to give us two litres of orange juice and a sack full of fruit jellies as they were so impressed with our tour! We took a few fruit jellies although should’ve taken more as the sugar rush is great when you’re feeling low on energy.
The rest of the day went through Bourg and past the Grotte Pair Non Pair to the camping à la ferme at Villegouge. The campsite was beautiful…in the gardens of a farm cottage with lots of chickens (who stole some of our dinner) and chicks and ducklings.
In the evening we went to the Fest Arts (street art festival) in Libourne to see Tortilla Mucho (some funny modern clowns laking a giant tortilla which was ridiculous but did make us chuckle) and some modern dancers do hip-hop and breakdance-style moves to Bolero….it was impressively done (man, were they strong and they only looked about 16 or 17 years old). We cycled back from the festival just before midnight and then thankfully our chain broke so we pushed the bike the last four kilometres but it gave us a good opportunity to look at the stars (until now we’ve been running to the tent at night ‘coz it’s too cold to dawdle).
On Friday we left the campsite very late as we needed to lie-in and we had to fix the chain. Luckily it was just the magic link that had come undone. We cycled off to St Emilion which is capital of some very good grand cru wine and had fun wandering around the cobbled streets and looking at the old church and buildings. We tasted some very good St Emilion ‘Le Croix Parent’ wine and some macarons (almond biscuits). Lots of British tourists and you can understand why as it really is a beautiful town. I’d definitely go back again but stay the night there.