As I desperately try to get on top of this blog (story of my life), it is such a joy when I find a whole load of handwritten notes that I've made in a journal , describing parts of our roadie. Here's my notes from the road:
Having looked at the forecast, we decided that best plan would be: cities when it's going to be raining, and cabins when it's going to be sunny; La Rochelle for the weekend and onto a cabin the following week.
We sent William to school on the Friday morning to give us time to pack. We had lunch in the house and were on the road by around 1.30pm. Iain had a sudden attack of fatigue (we put it down to getting his covid job) so I took over the driving and did most of the 3.5hrs to La Rochelle.
We'd chosen well with the hotel. William had separate wee sleeping area in our room and it was a leisurely 10min walk to the Old Port and the thick of the action. We excitedly sunk a bottle of wine in the room then headed out to explore the city. We landed upon a standard touristy restaurant on the quayside where they served fresh seafood and more importantly, were showing the football (Scotland v England, Euros). It was a rather unsatisfying 1-1 draw but at least we got to see some of it whilst lapping up the great La Rochelle atmosphere. Before we knew it, we were on the Irish coffees followed by the cognacs and it was a bit of a long and winding road home. 😉 And a spinny room upon return. 😳
Iain took William to the city zoo across from the hotel early on the Saturday morning while I had some much needed extra time in my bed. Then it was down to the hotel buffet breakfast (couldn't actually tell you the last time I had one of the them) then planning for the rest of the day in a rather dreich La Rochelle. We decided upon the Aquarium (seemingly, the top tourist attraction in La Rochelle), got our rain jackets on and umbrella looked out and headed out. It was pretty impressive and certainly far better than the one in Biarritz (that we'd only visited a couple of weeks earlier). The most unexpected part being the incredible indoor rainforest with the piranhas! We took the audio tours and William was actually really into them, probably listening to about 60% of the info stations. We finished up and emerged from the aquarium into yet more drizzle and very heavy skies so quickly found a cheap and cheerful takeaway place for lunch where I managed to get a reasonably safe looking salad while the boys got baguettes.
The afternoon involved us seeking out more culture, this time in the form of some war history - the site of the German Navy Commander's bunker during WWII, preserved and turned into a museum. The place was fascinating but not for a five year old, so we were probably forced to race round the exhibits a lot faster than your usual punter. We had another wander through the lively streets (what a difference in the weather in just a couple of hours) then headed home for some quiet time.
After some naps, we wandered back into town, in search of dinner. As a bigger, certainly more touristy town than the one we live in, I was actually quite disappointed at the lack of gluten free listed-on-the-menu available. I found none, and no-one in my social networks could recommend anywhere specifically GF friendly either so it was back out for some dinner roulette. Still feeling a little dusty from the previous nights' indulgences, I had a small notion for a curry so when our only recommendation (André's) was full, and there was an Indian restaurant up the road, it was meant to be. And my god, I am so pleased to have had the second choice - it was easily the best curry we've had in France. Portion size, flavour, consistency of the different dishes; it was just brilliant and exactly what we (I!) needed.
Sunday began with another hotel breakfast but after eating so much the night before, it almost felt wasted on us. The weather was a bit better today but we'd already agreed that Maritime Museum would be on our agenda plus a trip on the river taxi! Oh what joy - I bloody love a river taxi! We didn't really know what to expect from the Maritime Museum but we were pleasantly surprised. Loads to see and do, especially for the entrance fee. Highlights included playing the deck games and going on the meteorological ship where William was simply raging that we dragged him away from the control deck.
We grabbed a quick late lunch back at the old port (it might not have a lot of GF menu options but at least La Rochelle does serve food all day) then Iain headed back to the hotel for his father's day massage. Meanwhile, William and I headed to the huge playground in town which he'd so wanted to play at the day before but couldn't, due to the rubbish weather. We hung out there for ages then finally wandered home to see how Iain had gotten on. Brilliant, by all accounts. Raphael had really knocked lumps out of him, apparently!
Our evening didn't really pan out as we anticipated (couple of apéros, dinner, home...). Instead, we went to La Rochelle's Scottish bar which served proper cider on tap. As you can imagine, we quickly "got the flavour" so dinner was abandoned in favour of planchas of jambon, cheese pâte, bread (no bread for me, bien sûr!), packets of crisps and playing with the landlord's Beagle, Zoë. Top drawer parenting right there. 😬 One for the road meant cocktails overlooking the old port where we all got the most ridiculous cocktails (even William was allowed an absurdly overpriced drink) which provided us with all sorts of weird and wonderful light up toys, keyrings and magnets as mementos. That really should've been the end of it but our walk home took as past a place that we'd seen on Friday night, down by a wee river and clearly full of local trendies. It was still open so it only felt right to tread where the locals do. These things are always good at the time but I was regretting my choices on Monday, that's for sure.
Iain's massage on Sunday had the "father's day treat" behind it but he said that I should also book in for one. Who was I to argue? I'd arranged mine for Monday morning before our final check out. It wasn't brilliant timing as I was a bit harassed getting packed up etc (especially because I was dusty!) but once I got down to the spa and got into it, it was actually really good. I'm all about the Anita Walsh level of massage. You know those ones that leave you with bruises afterwards? Otherwise I just find them all a bit boring and pointless. This was definitely in the kicking the absolute sh!t out of you category and it was the perfect tonic to release all those toxins from the night before. Raphael definitely deserves a special mention in my Trip Advisor review!
Noon rolled round, we checked out, and it was back in the car and onto the next destination on our summer roadie: Île de Ré.
Lorna
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