Bordeaux: One More for the Road

October was coming to an end and with it, so was my four month workation in Rotterdam. With just one break and diminishing funds remaining, I left the final destination up to chance. Whatever flight was cheapest on my days off, that's where I was going.

A couple of searches via cheapoair, skyscanner, momondo and finally Kayak later, fate determined that I was going to Bergerac, France.

With that decided, I had a new, more pressing question. What was I going to do in Bergerac for five days? The town is best known for two things: wine and a large-schnozzed romantic. I like wine. I vaguely remember Steve Martin playing this guy, Cyrano de Bergerac in a movie a million years but nothing about this combo sounded interesting enough for five days.

 I expanded my search a bit and saw that Bordeaux was less than a two hour train ride away. C'est le done. This was going to be a wing it (and wine it) kinda trip.

The first step was getting to Bergerac. I was lucky enough to get invited into the cockpit for landing so I was probably one of the first to see how itsy bitsy teeny tiny the airport is. Had the Capt told me he made a mistake and we had landed on someone's farm, I would have believed him. And with good reason...the luggage cart was a farm tractor with a trailer behind it.

With the trains being about as frequent as one would expect, I had some time to explore the wee town. My findings: Not one but two Cyrano statues...

and a charming but slightly desolate medieval center (although to be fair, it was Sunday and I have yet to find a European town open on Sundays)...

Step two: Get to Bordeaux.

Now we were cooking with gas. Or wine. Or whatever one cooks with in southwestern France. This was a bustling multi-ethnic town with plenty do keep me busy for the next couple of days. 

Day one was devoted to Le Cite Du Vin, the recently opened wine museum. Right of the bat, the decanter-shaped building is super cool but I didn't imagine that there would be all that much to see inside I figured it would be the standard 'this is how x is made, now let's do some sampling' kind of affair.

I was tres mistaken. This place does a super deep dive into everything that is even tangentially related to wines. Armed with an audio guide, you start off with a detailed explanation of all the world's wine regions, go into all the varieties of wines, sidetrack into the invention of glass and how bottling revolutionized the industry, venture into trade routes and how wine was distributed, stop to smell the roses and every other element that might be used to describe wine, sit in at a virtual table listening to concierges and a million other displays that would easily take days if you were to stop and listen to every one.

I was there for a good five hours before reaching the rooftop and its promised tasting.

I enjoyed that part so I decided to continue the sampling at the Maison du Vin.  Translated to the house of wine, it is a venture sponsored by the tourism board to promote area's vineyards. Or better said, it's the best place in town to get full pours of quality stuff for just a couple euro per glass.

Another budget-saver is the Bordeaux City Card. A two day card is 36 € and includes unlimited public transportation, admission to the Cite du Vin (20€), a city tour (12.50€) and a bunch of other museums and watch towers.

On day two, I opted for the Tour Pey-Berland, which is the Cathedral St-Andre's bell tower. Unlike most bell towers that are integrated into the church itself, there was some concern that the vibrations of the clanging bell would be enough to bring the tower crumbling down onto the unsuspecting cathedral. Therefore, the tower is a standalone structure within falling distance. A mere 229 steps bring you up to the top and a spectacular view of the city.

A much easier climb awaits at the Porte Cailhau, a 15th century gatehouse from the original city walls. 

The Grosse Cloche: A former bell tower turned prison. 

After so much climbing, it was time to take advantage of that city tour and rest for a bit.

But the highlight for me was undoubtedly the miroir d'eau (or water mirror) located in front of the Place du Bourse. It is the world's largest reflecting pool and is mesmerizing 24/7.  With something so pretty, is it possible to take too many pics, thinking that each one is better than the one before? Maybe. Am I going to post them all anyways? Yup.

Nighttime brought some great bar hopping, lots of wine tasting and the kind of gluttonous eating usually reserved for a pre-execution last meal.

Round 1 of Many

Bar Sputnik

La Comtesse

This all made waking up the next day a little tougher but I was on the move. Based on some recommendations from my hostel, I took the train to St. Emilion, a perfect medieval hamlet that happens to have some of the best vineyards in the region.

It was named after Emilion, a hermit monk who lived in a cave for 17 years.  Today it is possible to visit this cave, as well as an cavernous underground church, but only with a guide. 

Inside the frescoes are wonderfully preserved, probably thanks to the same reason I have no pics of them- photography is not allowed.

The same excavations that led to the construction of an underground church also led to the use of a number of underground wine cellars.

St Emilion is a UNESCO world heritage site, a haven for wine enthusiasts and regularly described as one of the prettiest towns in the region so transportation should not be an issue. Only, it totally is. There is a train that goes through a couple of times a day but there is no working train station. You just kind of sit by the tracks and take it on faith that a train will come along.

One did eventually come by and transported me to my next stop, Sarlat la Caneda.  At first, I didn't quite see what the hype was all about. It seemed like a nice but unremarkable town. Then I turned off of the main road...

With its gas lamps and perfectly restored medieval architecture, I suddenly had the feeling that I had accidentally stumbled into a time portal of some kind.

The next morning, with the benefit of daylight, it was even more charming.

However, it proved to be more difficult to get out of than St Emilion. After a half day, I felt confident that I had covered most of the city and wanted to go further afield but was stymied at every turn. There was no bus, train, trolley or tour that I could find to get me out of there. I could not escape Sarlat.

On one hand, this forced me to sit still and take in the tranquil air. But on the other hand, I don't understand why the tourism infrastructure in a town that is so unquestionably geared toward tourists  can be so shitty. If they don't want visitors, fine. It's a small town. I get it. But you can't have a dozen nasty foie gras stores and constant signage promoting international shipping of wine cases and not provide for the basic visitor needs.

The Lanterne des Morts: the legend is that the dead in the nearby cemetery would wander off at night. This light was meant to guide them back.

The problem, I think, is that this is an area that is geared towards visitors who have their own transportation. Had I rented a car,  it would have been easy to fill my days visiting town after town. But going wheel-less in the Dordogne region is simply a pain in the ass.

I guess when you wing (and wine) it, this is bound to happen but overall, yet I'm still putting my French aventure in the win column. As the final trip during a wonderfully busy summer, this was  the wine-soaked cherry atop a fantastically busy Rotterdam summer sundae.