Tail-End of France (for now)
Rocamador to Biarritz
18.05.2011 - 19.05.2011
25 °C
Day 18:
Rocamador town to start with, reminded us a bit of Pitigliano in Tuscany. Gorgeous little town perched on the side of a cliff!
Dordogne is going to be hard to beat as it is such a beautiful area. We do hope it gets beaten though! Lots more to look forward to in the next few months.
We spent pretty much the whole day on the road, (6 hrs) with pretty much none of it spent on the motorway! So we got to really see the French countryside: the southern end of the Dordogne and foothills of the Pyrenees, and Napolivan felt fine the whole way! Winding roads, fields, forests, lots of pretty little villages.
By the time we wanted lunch there wasn´t a spot to pull over really, and the end of the arvo was a slightly more boring drive as the scenery wasn´t spectacular. Hopefully the longest drive we´ll have to do in Napolivan, 6 hours was enough for him -and for Nick!
Day 19:
Rainy in the morning, so we had a much needed lie-in.
Headed out on the bikes to find some brunch in town - we turned the wrong way out of the campsite however and ended up going in a big loop up and down hills to reach the town!
Biarritz reminded us of a bit of Coogee, Bondi and Surfers Paridise all rolled into one. Although no sky-scrapers, it was very built up, right along the beachfront. A pretty beach and headland though, and we found a really cool bar (more of a shak!) over looking the beach that served food. One raw steak and piece of quiche later, we continued the ride along to Bayonne.
A much prettier, smaller version of Biarritz, Bayonne was well worth the (not so pretty) ride alongside the river which didn´t actually take us right on the riverside, but next to the road. Visited Bayonne Cathedral and wandered about the town for a bit.
On the way back to camp, we just HAD to go to the Chocolate Museum!!
Our entry tickets came in the form of a few little chocolate buttons, and a hot chocolate at the end of the visit! It was very interesting, but mostly because of the luscious smell wafting through the place!
The chocolate gave us a bit more energy for the final few hills to get back to the campsite. Not too big a ride, only 35kms, but more hills than we´ve been used to!
Posted by Emso 20.05.2011 07:02 Archived in France Tagged dordogne
