Today we visited the imposing Blaye fortress. Situated as it is on the heights overlooking the Gironde estuary, there would have been a military installation here from the very earliest times. In fact the remains of Eleanor of Aquitaine’s castle nestle inside the walls. Remember her? King Richard’s and King John’s mum? Louis XIV’s military…
In Australia and New Zealand if you want to taste an estate’s wines you rock up to the cellar door and say, “Can I’ve a taste?” But it’s not like that in France. It seems – especially for the more prestigious chateaus – you need an invitation. So Uniworld organised invitations. Mind you, Scenic organises…
Monday dawned hot and still. The temperature was forecast to reach 38+ (100F) and we were warned to take water with us on our journey to a chateau that made sauterne. Making wine is a delicate art and it has its own terminology. I tend to work on the basis that “I likes what I…
We checked out of our Milan hotel, ready to hit the road for Malpensa terminal two, where we’d catch our flight to Bordeaux. In a last, “thanks for staying, do come back” gesture from the clerk at reception, we were overcharged the city tourist tax. As an extra inducement to tourists, you have to pay…
Pete and I, with our friends Sandy and Col, had been planning our great European adventure for some time. We’d booked a one-week wine and food cruise with Uniworld in France’s Aquitaine region, and a small group tour of Tuscany, also one week, with Collette. The two sets of dates weren’t contiguous, though, so…
Hi there. Have you missed me? We’ve been Up Over with good friends Sandy and Col for a few weeks, sampling food and wine and seeing a few sights in France and Italy. Our trip started with a couple of nights in Milan to settle the jet lag before we flew (on easyJet) to Bordeaux,…
Several years ago we used to put bird seed out for the parrots. While lorikeets mainly feed on nectar, a lot of the other breeds like cockatoos, corellas, and pink and greys, like seed. The trouble is, at first you get a trickle, then you get a flood and there’s this pushing, shoving, jostling bunch…
The annual whale migration from the Antarctic up both coasts of Australia is underway. Numbers are growing and though it’s early days before the main influx, there are quite a few whales in the Bay. I decided to take advantage of some wonderful cool, calm, Winter weather and go off on a whale watch to…
Ho hum. The Football World Cup is coming to its conclusion and many of the people I know who are interested in the round ball game were hoping for a France-England clash. I must admit there would have been something historically satisfying about a France-England clash. The Poms might finally have got their own back…
I don’t know about you but I’m getting a little bit sick of reading about ISSUES such as the price of electricity, equitable distribution of GST, ‘single use’ plastic bags that aren’t, and Donald Trump. And Brexit. Not that these matters are not important – they are. But they become depressing, so for this Saturday…