Our first guests arrive, topiary and tapas

Waking to the chorus of frogs and distant cuckoo calls I was encouraged to see much more blue sky with the forecast promising 28C later.

We spent a cruisy morning driving around visiting old favourites and chasing photo opportunities as well as scoping out the the canoeing opportunities for when our party is complete. The Dordogne is not the gentle meandering river with plentiful shingle and sand banks that we saw in 2016 but we saw with relief that canoeing is still happening so will save that for next week.

Château de Castelnaud-la-Chapelle

Leaving Russell home to prepare the welcome mat (and dinner,) Zoe and I set off for Bordeaux airport to collect Fiona, Sharon and Annette who were due to land at 6pm. The drive was scheduled to take a little over two hours according to google maps but having had previous experience with construction around Bordeaux we allowed plenty of time, fortuitous given that we hit the outskirts at rush hour and crawled the last 20km.

We were still in time though, to greet the travellers as they emerged through the doors looking understandably weary and no doubt happy to be finally on the ground after three flights.

We managed to get back to our 'chatette' in enough daylight to have dinner on the tower terrace and wow the girls with the view whilst they could still keep their eyes open.

Awake early the next morning we had cups of tea by the frog pond and welcomed Ithaque (alias Clifford) the neighbour's dog, who likes to visit when he hears company.

We were also rewarded with sight of a hot balloon on the horizon which opened discussions about who would up for a flight next week, weather permitting….

Wanting to capitalise on the blue sky and sunshine we decided to visit Les Jardins d'Eryignac. This is a stunning garden which has been in the same family for 500 years and features elaborate topiary in the Italian renaissance style as well as fountains, statues and stunning vistas.




There was even an equestrian element to keep us happy and an excellent lunch to finish off where we were waited upon by a delightful young man called Adrian who was very tolerant of our French (mis) pronounciation of the menu.

 

 

On the way home we let the girls loose in the Carrefour to decipher French labels before heading home to soak up a couple of hours of sunshine pool side.

With the new arrivals coping well on day one post international flights, we booked dinner at Le Bouchon ( the cork) a name with some significance to the group – it was the name of Sharon's horse on the 2015 ride.


The friendly staff, delicious tapas and sangria were a fitting way to end the day as we planned an early start for Sarlat's Saturday market the next morning albeit with more rain forecast…

 

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