We left Dinan with the intention to see a bit more of Brittany and so decided to go to the Medieval castle in tiny Josselin. We didn’t manage to visit the castle (a word of advice here — castle tours are only possible with a guide and at scheduled hours) but we did eat a delicious and soft ham omlette (the famous omlette jambon), my “must-eat” (goat’s cheese salad) and French snails. All these specialties we found at Le Guethenoc restaurant, on the main square in Josselin, right next to the church.
From Josselin we went to our main destination, this is the port of La Rochelle in the region of Poitou-Charentes. The town has lived quite a turbulent history as in in earlier years it was a political headquarters of the Huguenots, then a fortress and a base of the German submarines during the II World War.
Port in La Rochelle
Today it is a beautiful, lively town like the ones you’ll find in southern Europe. We were enchanted by beige and white houses, streets covered with tiles in warm colours, shining from the steps of numerous walkers… What is more, we found a very nice modern hotel for 89 euro per night (www.hotelmonnaie.com). Believe me that in France this is a bargain 😉
La Rochelle
Looking at a wide range of places to eat, we chose Andre (www.barandre.com) for our first dinner. The restaurant attracted guests with a pile of fish, mussels and prawns at the window display as well as fishermen bringing once and again boxes full of fresh oysters and other shellfish. We liked our seafood dishes ( e.g. mussels in Pineau sauce) and desserts but I wouldn’t call it a must on our foodie list.
A place not to be missed, on the other hand, are restaurants run by a Mr Gregory Coutanceau. Finding them is easy as they are located in some of the central spots of the town. We went to L’entracte and Les flots. These restaurants serve exquisite and delicious food but, as you can imagine, are not cheap. There is a way to go round this problem, though! You can choose a set menu — it costs about 30-40 euro and will definitely fulfil the expectations of every gourmand. Starting with the appetizer (e.g. salmon served in various ways or an originally prepared tuna sashimi), followed by the main course and finished with the dessert, everything was absolutely excellent. For me, the most interesting part were two sorbets served with desserts: raspberry with a hint of red peppers and a Capirinha flavoured one.
Łukasz found himself on the culinary cloud number nine when, in Les Flots, he tasted a lobster with potatoes in truffle sauce. He liked it so much, that he asked the waiter to bring him a second helping, which made the man smile broadly.
My mouth waters even today every time I take a look at these pictures 😉
The dessert at L’entracte:
Nougat cake, meringue and a raspberry and pepper sorbet
and the starter…
Langoustines
Colourful houses on the oyster island
From La Rochelle we decided to head to the wine region of Bordeaux and on our way visit also the area of Marennes and the oyster island called Ile d’Oleron.
Magically colourful island of Oleron
Multi-coloured houses and sleepy atmosphere more typical for a village on the Yucatán Peninsula totally surprised us. Are you sure we’re still in France? If you’re really lucky, you’ll be able to get a plate full of fresh oysters and a glass of wine for a very good price. The local fisherman will offer you a rather shabby-looking table and plastic chairs. From his own pond he will fish out a couple of boxes of oysters and you, my dear (and only) customer will have the possibility of choosing the ones you want to eat. And one more thing — it will all cost you about 8 euros.
Ile d’Oleron
Saint Emilion
Our next stop was Saint Emilion, a Medieval town situated close to Bordeaux.
Wine, wine, wine
Beautiful vineyards, mansions made of stone, old walls — all this creates a truly film-like atmosphere. If you want to really feel it, the best thing to do is to stay in one of the vineyards. Tourist information in Saint Emilion will give you all the details on available accommodations options, together with all facilities and prices. This is how we got to Chateau Monlot. There, for a 100 euro (including breakfast — yes, quite pricey) we stayed in a stylish room overlooking the vineyard and ate our French breakfast with, of course, a fresh croissant surrounded by the atmosphere of the years gone by… To wake up in an old vineyard and see vast areas of grapes growing to “become” wine, with green landscape all around, open wooden window shutters and have breakfast in a room, where time has stopped, among old walls and photos showing the history of the vineyard owners and their ancestors — all this is priceless.
The French Basque Country
As we were already quite tired by the busy schedule of our trip, when we entered the French Basque Country we decided to visit only Ainhoa, described in our travel guide as “the most beautiful Basque village”.
The Basque fairy tale
- Well, the guide was absolutely correct: white houses with green or red roof tiles and window shutters, slightly sloping roofs, green hills… a truly magic landscape. Even though the route leads through lots of twists and turns up to the mountains and can be pretty tiring, it is definitely worth going there. The whole way is dotted with small Basque hut and the area looks as if no modern civilisation has never left its mark there.
Colours of the houses seem to refer to the flag of the Basque Country called ikurriña in euskery (the Basque language). On the flag, the red symbolises one of the Basque provinces Vizcaya, white illustrates the Basque Catholicism, and green stands for the independence of Euskadi by referring to the sacred tree in Gernika, where centuries ago the kings sworn to respect the right of the Basque people. Until today ikurriña is one of the most powerful symbols of regional nationalism, visible especially in the Basque provinces of Spain… but we’ll come back to this when I visit San Sebastian.
But let’s go back to Ainhoa… unfortunately we don’t manage to eat in Ithurria restaurant praised for very good traditional Basque dishes — it turns out that the closer you are to Spain, the more you have to take siesta time into account.
If you have more time for this region, you should definitely go to luxurious Biarritz, typically Basque Bayonne and a port town of St-Jean de Luz. I really wish we had!
Basque landscape
From Ainhoa there is a picturesque route all of a sudden (out of the blue you see a carniceria and a panaderia along the way) takes you over the Spanish border and further to do Donostia-San Sebastian — a must see whenever you’re travelling in the Basque Country.
This Spanish part of our journey I will, however, tell you about later… now let me invite all the fans of siesta, fiesta and mañana on a virtual tour of this less known part of Spain — not so sunny, greener, less crowded nut still with a lot of surprises waiting for everyone 🙂
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