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| A garden in Toulouse. |
On Friday 29th June, we took the train to Bordeaux,
where there was a wine festival, for 4 days. We stayed 2 days, sampling
Bordeeaux wines. There were tasting pavillions along the foreshore. We visited
Millésima, a fine wine sales outlet. They sold quality wines, only with corks
made from the cork tree. we were shown a large bottle of champagne in a metal
box, priced at 3000 euros.
At 11pm one night, we saw a 400 sq. M. light show
on the Palais de la Bourse. That was followed at 11.30 by a fireworks dispay
which was extremely noisy but didn't last long.
As our main course one evening we decided to sample
Calamari (squid) with a black ink sauce. The black ink was from the sack of
the calamari. Our meal was black, different & a bit tasteless.
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| Bordeaux wine festival. Along the foreshore |
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| Bordeaux wine festival. Along the foreshore |
On Sunday 1st July we flew to Bristol. where we
hired a rental car & drove to a B & B in Goodrich, Herefordshire.
Lindsay & her parents , Alan & Barbara also joined us there.. The
purpose of our visit was cider tasting & to visit that area of England which
which we had not seen much of previously.. The countryside is very green &
picturesque. It rained every day except for the day we returned to France. We
visited cideries. I had cider with lunch & dinner. Barry mostly drank ale,
which he likes as he finds it has more flavour straight from the tap & not
chilled, as beer is in NZ.
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| Ledbury, Herefordshire in the rain |
The Cathedrals in Ledbury & Hereford were
impressive. At Hereford Cathedral we saw the Mappa Mundi & Chained Library.
These are two of Britains most important historical treasures.& are
displayed in the new library building with displays of rare books, documents
& artefacts dating from the 8th Century..
The Hereford Mappa Mundi is the largest surviving
complete medieval world map. It is made of velum (calf skin), I think it must
have been a big calf!. During Medieval times people had no idea that NZ &
countries in our part of the world existed.. At the Cathedral we also saw the
Hereford 1217 Magna Carta.
One day we visited Barry's 3rd cousin, who lives in
Shropshire. He has been in contact with her during genealogy research. we had a
very interesting day. She gave Barry some documents which she had inherited from
her Great Grandfather.
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| Maise with sunflowers in the distance |
On the 5th July we returned to Moissac. Trevor
& Isabel joined us the next day. We spent 6 days travelling on the canal de
Garrone & then the Baïse River. I had a rest from doing much of the rope
work as Trevor was happy to go ashore with a card to activate the mechanism
which starts the opening or shutting of the lock gates & emptying or filling
of the water, then help with the ropes around the bollards & back to the
boat.
Nérac, on the Baïse River is one of the most
beautiful towns we have visited in France..
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| Nérac |
Our turning around point on the Baïse was at
Condom. (Nothing to do with the device!) This was once a busy River port where
barrels of Armagnac & rolls of cloth were landed onto barges on their way
towards the Garrone & Bordeaux.
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| The Three Muskateers & D'Artagnan, at Condom |
Now we are making our way back to
Argen.
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| Cooked escargots in the foreground, ready for sale at the evening market in Vianne |
