More wet and dry…. but now with gales!

Thursday night after we got back around 7.30 p.m. we had a bit of tea, and then I popped up to the bar to watch England play Holland in the Nations League Semi Final.  I arrived to see only one other watcher who looked suspiciously Dutch (and was) so we nodded politely to one another before settling down to watch. A few others sloped in over the next 30 minutes or so, until there was quite  contingent of mainly English ‘fans’.  It wasn’t worth the wait though, and I stormed off in disgust after Hollands third goal went in deep into extra time, as it was by now quite late and we’d had a long day.

Friday was again wet, and neither of us had a particularly good night, so we decided to take it easy and had a leisurely start. The tail end of Storm Miguel hit us in the morning too, blowing the caravan about and making us nervous about how secure our canopy would be. It certainly tested the fixings but thankfully everything held, and by late afternoon the storm had blown itself out and the sun came out.

By now we were getting a little stir crazy so we jumped in the car and popped off to the next village along the Dordogne – Tremalot about 10 minutes away where we were told there was a lovely viewpoint over the river.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I must say it didn’t disappoint, and we took some super photos before returning to the site for another gripping episode of Brokenwood Mysteries and an early night.

Saturday was a lovely day with bright blue skies and the temperature in the mid 20’s.  Determined to improve on our performance of the previous day we set an alarm and were on the road just after 9.30 to visit Cadouin, a village about 15 km away which we’d passed through a couple of times already, and looked like a good place to explore.

Cadouin has an Abbey founded in 1115 by Geraut de Sales which became extremely prosperous during the middle ages particularly as a place of pilgrimage.  This was mainly as a result of the Holy Shroud of Cadouin, a linen cloth adorned with bands of embroidery which was believed to have been wrapped around Christ’s head. However, as the information leaflet said – Scandal! – in 1934 two scientists determined that the shroud was made in the 11th century as the embroidery mentions an Emir and a Caliph who had ruled in Egypt in 1094 and 1101.  The Bishop of Perigueux therefore had the pilgrimage to Cadouin discontinued in disgrace.

We baulked at paying the cloisters museum 7 euros each for the privilege of seeing this fake cloth, so satisfied ourselves with a walk around the Abbey and a short walk up the panorama, where we encountered a group of locals dressed in medieval clothing being schooled for, what we assumed would be, a performance.  The panorama was frankly disappointing, but bearing in mind our recent explorations, most probably would be!

It was quite early, so we decided to drive onto Belves, another town we’d spotted on our way back from La Roque-Gageac on Thursday, and where we knew there was a market on Saturday morning.  It turned out to be another beautiful medieval town where we spent a lovely couple of hours exploring and buying cherries, and a dress! We also, at long last, found a stall selling fresh herbs – we’ve been trying to buy fresh basil since we arrived in Spain with no luck until today – unbelievable! Now I can finally make the Panzanella salad Debi gave me the recipe for at our picnic on the M1!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We had a relaxing afternoon by the pool, then arranged to go with Peter and Ro to the bar across the river in Limeuil in the evening. We’d seen a poster on a previous visit promising an evening of live 80’s music starting at 8pm so the four of us headed off with their dog May at about 7.30. The bar was quite full when we got there but we found a table alongside the river and eventually the music started at about 9pm. It was an unusual musical arrangement, with an acoustic guitarist, a violinist and a singer who styled himself on Robert Smith from the band The Cure – plenty of black eyeshadow! The music was varied, and we played Guess that Tune for the first few numbers, but we soon tuned in our ears and recognised tracks by David Bowie, Dire Straits, the Eurythmics, Simple Minds, and also a version of 99 Red Balloons (in the original German!). The locals were out in force and for a really good time, the atmosphere was lively and we had a good evening singing along.

We woke up to another thunderstorm on Sunday morning, but the forecast was for things to brighten up by around 9.30, so we set off for the town of Issigeac which had been recommended to us by both Sue and Bob, and Gill and Phillip. It hosts the biggest market in the area each Sunday, and is also yet another stunning medieval town.

Satan said it was about 40 minutes drive away, but having got lost in our nemesis town of Beaumont (where we had the burst tyre) it took us a little longer.  We arrived in another cloudburst but eventually parked up and walked across the road straight into the market.  It takes over the whole of the old town and all the narrow streets, and despite the weather there were plenty of people there and a buzzing atmosphere.  This was helped by the French equivalent of medieval Morris Dancers, with a scruffy bagpipe player providing the music!

We bought cherry tomatoes, mushrooms, cheese bread and our first tartes aux pommes, and followed the walking tour (or at least tried!) which we’d got from Tourist Information.  It eventually stopped raining but was still overcast and cool so we decided to return to the caravan.

On our way back we once again passed through, and got lost again in Beaumont, which is where we’d had the flat tyre.  We therefore stopped to see if we could work out what had caused the problem, and found a storm drain which sticked out into the road – it was clear from the broken concrete that this is what I’d hit, and I probably wasn’t the only one!  Whilst it is clearly a bit of a hazard, nevertheless I shouldn’t have hit it.

When we got back we decided to cook, and had mushroom omelette for lunch, which was delicious.

The sun came out so I washed the car whilst Karol watched (!) and we spent the rest of the afternoon catching up with our books and the Sunday paper.