It’s still raining! We’re in Jarnac on the Aire outside the municipal campsite, another tip from the English couple we met in Angouleme. When the downpour stopped we took a walk around, it’s a thriving town and very picturesque along the river. We spend the evening in the manner now quite usual for us, that is with a bottle of wine in the company of people we’ve just met on the site. Hello again to Brian and Ann of Wareham in Dorset!
After another wet start the morning brightened up so we visited the Courvoisier museum, where we learned all about the stages required in brandy production; neither of us actually likes the stuff so please don’t think that we went in the hope of a free tipple! Our next stop is Cognac, another booze filled town of course! The Aire is close by the river and, although there are only 3 designated camper pitches, it is in a carpark and there were 16 of us parked each of the 3 nights we spent here. We met Jim and Caroline again just after we arrived, who are now on their way back up to the ferry, so we naturally spent the evening with them and a bottle of wine; since getting to France we seem to meet up with very amiable folks about once a week or so, but this week it’s twice in 2 days! The next 2 leisurely days were taken up just with exploring the town and walks along the river, making the most of the dry weather.
We move to Saintes , it’s raining here too! We went into town when the rain lessened and bought tickets for a river trip on a Gabarre, an old wooden boat which was used for moving cognac between warehouses, but we all had to take a refund because it had engine trouble, not a problem that would have arisen in its early days of sail of course! The next morning brings better weather and, after looking round the Abbe grounds, we round off our stay here with the set lunch at the Bottin Gourmand (similar to Michelin) restaurant on the corner of the Place de l’Abbe; 3 superb courses and wine for €20 each. We hadn’t planned to eat out today, but we don’t often find these restaurants and, when we do, the lunchtime menus are such good value that we nearly always take advantage of them.
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