We were in the midi-pyrenees, and though we didn't know it we were only 27 miles away from my old neighbours who left home to live and run a Chambre d'hotel in France; I didn't realise this fact at the time otherwise we might have been tempted to call in on them as well.
We headed up through France, through the Lot region, and it was extremely pretty; particularly so was the port on the Tarn we passed through and a very scenic little village that I forgot to make a mention of the name of but would have like to have had a coffee at if we had the time.
The Paper mill at Sarlat, gets a mention as it was extremely pretty and as we drove past it could have been right out of the middle ages; Zeltus thinks that it is a modern recreation but it was very good and hard to tell.
We stopped for a photographic moment (a first for us) at Jumilhac le Grand, the Rapunzel story is supposed to have originated from here; SOH in trying to turn his bike somehow lost the battle of weight vs obverse camber and she hit the deck, but luckily only a few scratches and no major wounds or trauma.
We manoevered the bikes in front of the fountain and took this picture :
We were only 6 miles or thereabouts from Zeltus at this stage, so we called to see if he wanted to come out on his bike, but he preferred to wait for us at home. I had been there about 3 years ago (yikes - really that long ago?) but as we neared his home it started to look very familiar; he lives opposite the church in the village so it wasn't difficult to miss him.
After making the suitable introductions, and changing into more comfortable clothes we sat down and had a pre-dinner drink before Zeltus kindly drove us all to the restaurent, making two journey's each way to ensure everyone could get there - cheers Bro.
The restaurent was typical french cuisine, and specialised in local dishes of the perigord region. I had the assiette perigord and shared with SOH who had the vegetable soup while Zeltus's wife shared with our leader the delights of her plate after giving me the dish of creme brulee with fois gras (which was delicious) and I look forward to trying in again in future.
We pigged out far more than we should have done and all of us felt full that night and it was hard to do justice to the spread that Zeltus and his wife put out for us the following morning.
The croissants and pastries came from the boulangerie just 2 mins away across the road along with cereals and cold meats we had a feast; unfortunately the two guests we had taken with us were not pleasant breakfast companions and I can only apologise to my brother and his wife who had put themselves out on our behalf and who didn't mention a word in front of them publicly. I know they felt upset at how these two 'guests' were rude and obnoxious given that Zeltus and his wife had only just got home from Cornwall and then were faced with opening up a gite, cleaning it and preparing for our stay with less than 24 hours notice and got very little thanks from our companions for doing so. If it helps we appreciated very much
It was too short a visit, but we have promised to go back before too long.
Daily Mileage : 147
Total so far on holiday : 1369
1 comment:
Don't you just hate people with so little sense of obligation, or at least common politeness.
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