Bordeaux

Saturday - we got up, packed and headed back to the markets for breakfast and a spot of people watching.  Matt found me a croissant jambon fromage which made me happy and the boys had the same as before I did the ordering and got told I spoke French well - I was a happy bunny.  We spent a pleasant hour watching the world go by imagining what it would be like if we lived here and could go shopping here for our food.

Dreaming over, we headed to the bus for the station and then on to our train to Bordeaux, we were worried we might not get on, as there were a lot of people on the platform, but all was ok. When we realised it was a long train, we walked to the end and got on easily.  Found a table with 3 spare seats, asked a man who was sitting there if it was free, he said yes, then got a massive hump, got up, refused to sit anywhere else, stared at Matt for 5 mins, then came back, pretended to pick up something from the empty chair and then pushed Tom's bag off the table and walked off.  Our first negative interaction - he was just an angry man though - you get them everywhere and luckily he got off at the next station and the rest of the trip was pleasant.  

We arrived in Bordeaux on time and our hotel was directly opposite the station which made it very easy.  We were able to check in straight away which was great.  The temperature had gone up, we were back in 30 plus degrees again. Our biggest hotel room yet with silent air conditioning - we are yet to achieve the hold trinity: air conditioning, tea making facilities and a fridge - normally 2 out of 3.  Anyway nice enough, the first time we weren't in an independent hotel.

Luckily the lady in Reception was extremely helpful, gave us a map and told us what to do to see as much of the city as possible.  Luckily there was a festival on (of course!) which meant that there was a special travel ticket available €3.40 for unlimited trips on the bus, trams and boat ferries - a relief as it was very hot and the city quite well spread out.  We got the tram to Place de la Borse, right on the river, an area where water fountains keep the ground wet, everyone takes off their shoes and gets wet feet (water wasn't particularly cold).  Some were lying in it!  We then got the water ferry up the Garonde to a bar area where we had a..,panaché each and then we went looking for a nice street with flowers etc in it - took a while but we got there in the end. First job was to get a glace as we were hot, it was very much a boho area, we found a huge antique store stuffed full of odd curios.  Somehow the boys fell in love with a bear who looked like he needed a home and jumped into their arms.

We then got a tram south to Port du Bourgogne (a mini l'arc de triomphe), walked up the river to Porte Caihau (a rather good looking chateau type gate).  Apparently Bordeaux was once a medieval city, but city planners decided to rip down the walls etc and build a grandeur version in its place.  These two gates are what remain of the medieval city.  The rest of the city really is very grand, they did a good job, looking at it, you would think it was the second city of France, but turns out the population is about 200k.

Next stop was Rue Sainte Katharine which apparently is the longest shopping street in France.  Today it was festival Braderie, basically the street also had a market on it for the length of it.  It was so so so busy, too busy for us country bumpkins, it wasn't pleasant browsing, it was stressful trying to move!  We decided that enough was enough, we were hot and bothered, so we went back to the hotel for a shower and reset before heading out again.  The plan was to go to Halles de Bacalan for tea - where there are food stalls etc, but it was a long way away and we were tired, so we decided to find something near the hotel.  I did some research - there was an old fashioned French restaurant nearby.  We went along and got a seat - no bother and had the cheapest meal of the holiday.  Toulouse sausage for Matt, steak frites for Tom and cordon bleu for me, and we all had dessert and a bottle of wine and it came to €66, an absolute bargain (although once again we had no vegetables!)  

The boys then headed into the station for a spot of train spotting whilst I chilled out at the hotel.

Biarritz

Wednesday, we packed up our belongings and walked up the hill to the train station - bit cooler today, but still a sweaty job.  We got the express to Bayonne which is just outside of Biarritz.  We had an hour and a half to kill at Bayonne, so found ourselves some lunch nearby the station - cheesecake for me and Tom and a local dense almond cake thingy for Matt.  Everyone in Bayonne was dressed in white and red, something was going on...we looked it up - only the largest festival in France - over a million people land there each year for 4 days of festivities.  We looked around stalls and made a vague plan to return, to find out what it was all about.

We got the train to Biarritz and then a bus to as close to our hotel as we could get before wheeling our very loud suitcases through the streets of Biarritz to our hotel.  Immediately we got the vibe for Biarritz.  We had read up on the place, apparently it was the place to go to in the 1920s/1930s, but then the Cote D'Azur took over and it went into decline until the 1990s when the surfers found it.  We were expecting it to be slightly shabby - oh no, not at all. Everywhere was immaculate, the people (of course) beautiful and it had a really good vibe (even better when 3 Brits aren't wheeling really noisy suitcases down the middle of the street).  We found our hotel, it also has a really cool vibe about it. Everything was rattan / macrame / earthy and the air conditioning was silent - yahhhhhhhoooooo.

We had showers and then headed out for a panaché to refresh and then for a little look in the cool looking shops.  The town is proud of its art deco heritage, there were lots of souviner shops with art deco style goodies - Matt fell in love with a door matt of all things. 

Matt knows a Japanese translator who lives near Biarritz, so he got some recommendations from her for tea and we headed to one of them - Casa Juan Pedro, right on the sea's edge.  We had to queue  for half an hour - but looking at the menu, fresh sea food and moules and prices, very reasonable, and the fact the queue did seem to move, we decided to wait it out.  It took 30 minutes to get seated, but we got served straight away so that was fine.  We had a plate of crevette brochettes to start with and then Tom and I had moules and Matt had a plate full of large grilled gammas for mains.  All washed down with a litre of white wine.  It was all delicious.  Even more so, because on the table sat next to us was Leo a nearly 3 year old playing with his cars who sort of adopted us.  

We tried to speak to him - but every time we tried he would say 'non', but he wasn't shy and we had fun playing with him. Made our night, in fact we decided it was more fun to stay there than to go home to watch England play in the world cup semi finals.  We got back just in time to watch us score and then mess up and loose.

Thursday, we got up around 9 and headed to Café Colombus for breakfast (a memory from Canada) where we all had a croque monsieur.  Bit cloudy and drizzly this morning, so we decided to have a useful morning and gathered up all our dirty, sweaty clothes and headed to the Laverie.  The Laverie just happened to be in a hip area of the city with a big market, a big kitchen shop, and a Carrefour City.  We put our clothes in and went for an explore.  The big kitchen shop did have moulds by my favourite mould maker (Scrap Cooking who are French) but didn't have anything useful unfortunately.  Went to Carrefour City for a drink and then headed into the market - which was rammed full of people and the most amazing produce.  Fruit, veg, bakeries, butchers, ham, fromage, you name it they had it and it all looked amazing.  We had found our breakfast spot for the rest of our stay.

We put our clothes in the dryer and headed out again, found an estate agent and found our dream home - just outside of Biarritz with swimming pool, 5 bedrooms and plenty of garden.  We have all taken to this town immediately and in a perfect world, would quite like a house here!

By the time we got our laundry back to the hotel, the sky had cleared and it was hot and sunny again.  We headed out for lunch - crepes/galette and then headed to the Aquarium for the afternoon.  Was in a very funky art deco building.  We saw plenty of fish, a couple of lovely turtles, seals (phoques in French!) 2 films, we were in there quite a while and get this - we got out of the shop without buying anything, although there was a lovely crab for €180 which was tempting but a little too large.

We got back to the hotel and then got ready for an hour on the beach - just 3 minutes walk from our hotel.  Was a gritty beach, but the water wasn't too cold, we all went in, I only shrieked once, for a paddle.  Was pleasant and had to be done.

We went back to the hotel for a shower and then headed out to meet up with James - the husband of the Japanese translator Matt knows - she had had to go back to Japan suddenly, but Matt had met James before, so we met up for a drink.  He is half British half French, grew up in Durham.  One of the most chilled men I have met, was a nice drink and meet up, shame we didn't have longer.  

We then headed back into town in search of dinner and ended up in Café de la Place.  We all went for the menu du jour - as it had local specialities on it.  I had a trout tart, followed by Poulet de Basque and Mousse au chocolat, the boys had Piquillos (cod stuffed peppers) and Tom had Chipirons (mini squid) for his main and apple tart for his dessert - all very good and of course, washed down with wine.

Friday, we got up and went to the markets for breakfast - more drizzle this morning, but it was still warm.  Pain au raisin for Matt (he was very happy as hotel breakfasts don't include pain au raisin which has made me wonder if it is a traditional breakfast food?!)  Tom and I went for Chausson aux pommes.  We then went back in to find ourselves some sandwiches for lunch.  We then got the bus to Cité de l'océan - we got tickets to this place in combination with the aquarium.  It was a venue with lots of immersive experiences based around the sea.  We did a couple of virtual reality sessions - one diving with sharks, 2 lots of surfing, coral conservation.  There were lots of interactive games, a polar base experience, a ship in a storm and our most favourite a 5d film of a module out of control skidding and crashing into various environments - polar bears, over the mountains to penguins (?!) then skiing, and all sorts of things.  We were shaken, splashed, blown and whipped with a cable - it was great fun - could have done it all day it we were allowed.  

We walked down to the beach to have our lunch and then walked back to the hotel along the coast line (and via a bar for a panaché of course!).  Then to the hotel, for a shower. We all then went out independently to do some holiday shopping - didn't get much but had a wonderful ice cream - cassis with lots of big fat blackcurrants.

We then went to the roof top bar on top of the Aquarium for our evening panaché, we were going to stay there for dinner, but the menu was very limited and quite expensive, so we headed back to Casa Juan Pedro as we knew the food would be very good, we all had something different and it was very good.

 

Lourdes

We arrived in Lourdes on time, it was hot, but the hotel was downhill, so we dragged our very loud suitcases down the streets to the Astoria Vatican.  Another 3 star hotel, we checked in, they were surprised to find I was a female, they had seen my name and assumed I was male, and put us in a twin room.  They found us a double bed opposite Tom's room and we made our way up to it.  The room was hot, hot, hot, but we put the air conditioner on and it worked - yahooooo.  However, every minute or so it growled at us - boooooo!   We tried everything, but were unable to stop it growling at us - it even growled at us when we turned it off!  Tom's room, of course was perfect, cold, air-conditioning with no growling and a view of the castle.   Lucky boy!

We had showers and then headed out for a panaché on the Pont Vieux - we are now under the impression that every town has a Pont Vieux.  Everywhere we looked there were monks, nuns and lots of people dressed in white with lanyards / neckerchiefs etc etc.  And oh my word the shops were insane.  We are talking mass consumerism, in every shop you could buy 100 different models of Mary - plastic ones, wooden ones, glass ones, neon ones, large ones, small ones and so on.  Also you could buy water bottles in the shape of Mary, for filling with holy water, a 100 or so different medals of saints, fridge magnets galore, towels, tea towels, t-shirts, mugs, shot glasses, towels, sweets, chocolates etc etc all with Mary.  

So we had to look up the story of the place.  Back in 1858, a peasant girl, Bernadette, saw an apparition of Mary in a cave.  She told her parents, they beat her and told her not to go back.  She went back and saw another apparition of Mary, and again and again.  In one apparition, Mary told her to dig in the mud to find water, she did so, and that is the source of the holy water.  In the end her parents and priests believed her - she saw Mary 8 times.  An artist was asked to make an image according to the apparitions Bernadette saw, apparently Bernadette was unhappy with it as the Mary she saw was very young the and the artist made her much older.  However, that image has stuck and that is what the souvineer shops all sell now.   Bernadette was made a saint. 

Catholics from around the world make a pilgrimage to the cave and church which is on top of the cave and take part in a candlelight parade in the evening.  Lots of ill people come to be blessed and drink the holy water. 

We felt like were in Vegas for Catholics,  not being at all religious, it was hard to take it seriously, as it was so over the top, but we did our best to keep our faces straight at the right times.

We had a good look around some of the shops, Matt couldn't help himself and bought a Mary water bottle for holy water. He also found me a patch which I was very happy about as it seems Catholics like tat but don't like proper tourist souviners such as patches!  We found ourselves in the Basilica of Notre Dame and after observing others, figured it would be ok to fill some bottles up with the holy water.  We were really surprised that 1) you could just walk in without any security, 2) it was free, 3) you could wander freely anywhere.  It was a big place.

By now it was tea time, so we went looking for tea and found it just outside the Basilica, sausage and frites for Matt, steak and frites for Tom and pork chop and frites for me - very French, very busy and unfortunately a little average.  The mass tourism here, has brought the prices down, but not driven quality up it seems. 

We then headed back to the Basilica for the 9pm torchlight procession.  Once again, it was open to anyone, and no-one was checked, all were welcome and there was a lovely atmosphere of peace about the place.  There were chariots galore with ill and old people in them, and then literally 1000s of pilgrims, with their banners etc (saw one from Ampleforth) who walked around the huge square, whilst priest prayed in French, English, Spanish and Italian.  There were people singing Ava Maria etc etc.  As I said it was quite peaceful but after an hour we decided to call it a day and headed back to the hotel.  We were just about to go to sleep when we heard some big bangs, and again.  Looked out the window - fireworks.  It is the 14th of July - Bastille Day.  Carine had told me that fireworks weren't allowed this year - Lourdes hadn't got the memo and we were treated to 25 minutes of really good fireworks.  Luckily Tom's bedroom had a really good view of them.

Next day it was boiling - it got up to 38 degrees, however, we had discovered that there was a really good cave system nearby and decided it would be good to visit.  We had tickets booked for 1.30, so we decided to head to the castle in the middle of the town for the morning. We got there easily, but stupidly decided to walk up the stairs to the top rather than take the lift, big mistake, in 5 mins time we were all sweating profusely!  Oh hum, we had a good explore around the castle - all the usual things - kitchen, portcullis, oil holes, herb garden, taxidermy animals - all of which were looking very grumpy, a tower and great views of Lourdes and the mountains around (some of which still had snow on them).

We walked back to the hotel and got ready for the caves, first stop lunch, we decided on icecream - which was served to us in the formation of a rose - never had that before, nice little touch.  We then fired up Uber to get a taxi to the caves, booked it, then it was cancelled.  Tried again, no joy.  The caves were a good 10 miles from Lourdes, so no chance we could walk it, and it was boiling.  We decided to walk to the train station and see if we could get a taxi from there.  They quoted us €50 - ouch!  Tried again with Uber, no joy, so we had to go with the other taxi.  So, it was a lovely trip out of Lourdes, very picturesque and we got to the caves in air conditioned bliss.  

Not sure how to describe the caves, they were amazing, and I mean AMAZING.  They were massive, and just full of formations - stalactites, stalagmites and pillars everywhere, you looked: big ones, small ones, MASSIVE ones etc, and it went on and on.  They had only named a couple of the formations because there were so many of them.  It was so full on that it just became normal to walk into a cavern and find it full of amazing formations. It made Ingleborough and White Scarr Caves just look rubbish.  Not sure any of us could go to them again now and be impressed!  Also, our guide was amazing, we had an audio translator device so we could hear commentary in English, but he was also fluent in English and funny too.  Also he was dressed as a typical French as you could get - a white shirt, blue suit type thing and a black beret.

After walking for about an hour through the caves we came to a dragon boat. 'Welcome to the White Star Line' our guide said as we got on (best line of the tour).  We sailed across a couple of flooded caverns and then carried on our way through tunnels until we came across a little train.  We all got on and then we had a high energy, fast ride back to the surface, bells clanging, lights flashing etc, great fun.  We were a little bit sad it was over, the temperature inside the cave was 14 degrees, it was 38 outside, we very much enjoyed being cool for an hour and a half.

We had a lovely tart each and then luckily we managed to get an uber taxi back (think our problem was that we were trying to get an uber taxi during lunch time which on reflection, probably wasn't a great idea!)  Our driver was from Chechnya - and we spoke to him in a strange combination of French and English.

We got back to Lourdes, had a rest and than headed back out in the heat for tea, ended up in a pizza restaurant which was about 40+ degrees but the pizza was good.  We then headed back to the hotel to watch France bow out of the world cup.

Béziers

A nice relaxed morning, hotel breakfast: granola with fruit and yoghurt followed by dippy egg (you can take the English out of England, but...) and cheese on baguette. Then a stroll to Valence station, a quick hop to Valence TGV station and then a 2 hour journey to Béziers.

It went without a hitch, except the boys were enjoying the journey so much that they didn't pack up in the and had a little panic when they realised we were almost in the station - luckily the train waited there for 5 minutes anyway.

We had to get an uber to the hotel as it was uphill and a good way away and it was boiling hot again.  When we arrived at 1.30, there was a notice that reception didn't open again until 3pm - arghhh.  Luckily we found a cleaning lady and managed to charm her enough that she opened the reception door and put our suitcases in it. meaning we were free to go.  Phew.

We were quite a way out of the main area of the city, so we decided to find a local Brasserie for a long lunch and then head back to the hotel for check in.  I think we found the only restaurant open - it is a holiday in France at the moment - coming up to Bastille Day on Tuesday.  The boys had poulet roti and I had escalope Milanese, with frites and salad and then ice cream for me and Matt and creme brulee for Tom (becoming the norm now) all washed down with...panaché.

We found a local supermarket which was open for cold drinks and crisps and then headed to the hotel where there was quite a queue of people ready to check in.  We checked in, 2 rooms, one with air conditioning working, one with air conditioning not working, guess which one we were in - arghhhhh.  I went to reception, they came to the room and said we weren't operating the ac properly, we took on their advice, it still didn't work - just blowing hot air around the room - in fact it was cooler outside than inside.  I complained again, but to no avail - we had a big fan in our room, Tom didn't - I think they knew the ac didn't work, they weren't going to move us!

Oh hum, we had showers and headed into to Béziers to explore. We found some Roman ruins, and then a square with lots of models of European cities, including London.  Not sure why, but I guess why not.  We then headed into the old town in search of the cathedral and bridges.  Béziers is the oldest city in France and pretty, but we had trouble finding the old town, we walked through the old town to get to the cathedral, but it was scruffy and had interesting characters hanging around it - the guide book talked of shops and scenic streets - unfortunately we didn't find them.  We did find the cathedral and the pont vieux which was very scenic. We then walked along the Canal du Midi to the 9 locks which the town is famous for.  They were ok, there were fountains, horse sculptures etc which were ok, but it was hot and humid and when we got there, everything had just closed.  So, we walked back to the town and headed to the main boulevard and the square with the European cities.  We sat down and had tea - an ice cream for me and crepes for the boys.  We waited around for the models to light up, but we discovered they didn't until 10pm and we couldn't be bothered to wait that long.  We walked back to our hotel for a cidre (in the fridge) and bed.  

Can't say we slept well, we ended up opening the window as it was cooler outside than in our room!  We got some sleep but not a lot.  Luckily we were were only here for 1 night.  We had breakfast, packed up and walked down the hill to the train station. 

I don't think we got the best out of Béziers, not finding the main part of the town and the hot hot hotel room didn't really charm us.  We are off to Lourdes now, not sure what to expect, been told there are lots of trashy Catholic merchandise shops, should be fun.  We are staying at the Vatican hotel!

Valence

We were up at 7.30 so we could feed ourselves a good breakfast and then headed to the station for one of our longest train days. 

We were off to Valence.  We took the local train to Mulhouse, then the TGV from Mulhouse to Valence TGV and then a local train into Valence ville.  Met a lovely French man on the last train, who recommended we do a bike ride on our full day.

 We got to the Hôtel de France wthout any bother.  2 x air-conditioned rooms, yeah!  It was hot, hot, hot.  We decided to have showers and then go out for a little explore.  We looked around the park which is supposed to be the main attraction in the town, but it has obviously been too hot for too long and was brown and deserted.  We headed into town and found a nice square with bars, so sat down, had a panaché each and then went for another little look, but it was too hot, so we went back to our hotel room for a rest and decided to try again at 7.  

We met in the lobby at 7, played Uno and then headed out, it was a little cooler, we went back to the square found an outdoor table and enjoyed burgers x 2 for the boys and pasta and prawns for me.

Matt and I did quite a bit of research trying to find what to do in Valence, we couldn't find anything that wasn't archeology / art so we decided to go with the man's recommendation and hire some bikes.  We found a place to hire them for and then got ourselves on the bike trail: Via Rhona which hugs the Rhône from Geneva to Marseille.  It was flat (phew) and although it was screamingly hot (it got up to 40 degrees today) by cycling we were creating a breeze which actually made the heat more manageable.  The first bit was along the river, in the shade, we met a lovely friendly man who's parents lived in Camberley for a while, so he had some English (better than our French anyway!) In fact most of our interactions have been good, lots of friendly people.  People on the whole do revert to English when they hear us, but less so in Valence.  We haven't heard a British accent since arrival, we have seen a couple of cars, but that's it.

Luckily the bike route, which was apart from the road, took us straight past an Intermarché so we stopped there for a cold drink and then continued on our way.  The route took us into the French countryside, we passed nectarine (or where they plum) groves, a leaning castle tower, and a number of small villages.   En route, we saw an advert for a bakery, so decided to head there for lunch,  It was in the beautiful village of Charmes du Rhône.  We got there 30 mins before it shut (phew).  Tom and Matt shared a slice of pizza whilst I had a gorgeous raspberry tart.  We all had cold drinks.  The village was what I would describe as a typical rural French village - all shutters, stone and cobbles.  All very quiet.  

 We decided that we were as far as we were going to go, it was getting hotter and our bums were beginning to ache, so we headed back more or less the same way - didn't seem so far on the way home.  We stopped at the Intermarché again for a cold drink each and then arrived back in Valence.  We did have to climb a hill back up to the hire shop and I was concerned I would have trouble as these bikes were very heavy, but it wasn't a problem, I surprised myself!

We handed the bikes back, went to the hotel had a shower before we did anything, then a bit of a rest before heading out to the nearby Laverie with two big bags of sweaty clothes. (Very reasonable under €10 to do it all including drying - cost that for one item in the hotel!)

We then hid from sun in our air conditioned rooms until 7pm when we met in the lobby for Uno and then headed out to the same square (but different restaurant) for tea.  Cliques Ardechoises for Matt and I - a local delicacy (bit like a rösti) and a pizza for Tom.  A creme brûlée for Tom and Matt and I shared a mousse au chocolat.  Then back home, early night, we were all exhausted- didn't see any of the England world cup football match but woke up to find we had won.

Chateau du Haut Koenigsbourg et aigles

Today we decided to do a side trip to Chateau du Haut Koenigsbourg.  

First though a hotel breakfast - our first of the trip and we were excited.  It was good - unfortunately no pain au raisin which is Matt's go to breakfast in France, but there were croissants and pain au chocolats.  Also yoghurt, fruit, muesli, baguettes and lots of cured meat and smelly cheese.  We were all happy and stuffed when we came out. 

We staggered over to the railway station and got the local train to  Sélestat and then a shuttle bus up to the castle which was on top of a mountain.  On the way up we came across 3 other attractions - 'Flight of the Eagles', 'Monkey Mountain' and 'Cigoland' - a theme park based around storks for little ones.

Wow, just wow, the castle was straight out of Disney - it was hugging the top ridge of the mountain and had towers all over the place, we went in under a portcullis and were just amazed by the place - it has obviously been restored recently and was looking very handsome.  All the rooves were immaculately tiled there were spires all over the place.  We got to go inside, where once again the rooms were immaculate.  

The castle was originally built by the Germans in the 12th century.  It was made a ruin in the 1400s by locals torching it to remove undesirables, rebuilt and burned down again by the Swedes during the 30 years war in 1633.   Kaiser Wilhelm II started to restored it in the early 1900s, but it was handed over to the French in 1919 with the Treaty of Versailles.  However, they have kept it as found.

We enjoyed a couple of hours exploring it, it looked like it had been built just recently - it certainly was immaculate.  We didn't get to see it all, but we saw enough and with it only costing €6 to enter (we discovered we got a €6 reduction for getting the bus up!) it really was very good value. 

One thing we had never seen before, Kachelofen stoves - huge tiled constructions in each room which would be filled with fire and heat the room (it gets very cold here in the winter).  We saw lots of Imperial Eagles in the decorations.  But mainly it was the building itself which was so impressive - it even included a windmill!

Once we were done we had an ice cream to cool down (hot, hot, hot again) and then decided to try out Flight of the Eagles on the way down (our bus ticket was a day rover ticket).  This was a birds of prey attraction in a ruined castle (oh - interesting statistic - there are over 500 castles in Alsace!) we got more discount for using the bus - so much so that the bus ticket was less than free!  They had a fabulous range of birds of prey including:

+ Bataleur Eagles

+ White tailed Eagles

+ Stellar's Sea Eagles

+ Bald Eagle

+ Lots of vultures

+ Eagle owl

+ Great Grey Owl

+ Secretary bird

+ Perigrines

+ Black Kites

and lots more.

We went round the cages saying hello, saw that there was an animation, so went in to view it - it was a lecture by one of the keepers who was going into immaculate detail on the birds, their feathers etc etc.  Too detailed and too fast for us, so we left and got ourselves a good place for the show in the shade. 

The show was AMAZING, they got most of the birds out and they flew into the audience- literally a cm above our heads, I had a moment when I was staring the Eagle Owl directly in the eyes.  We all got swooped by various birds, which was thrilling.  Not seen a show like it, not sure it would be 'allowed' in the UK, shame!  We saw peregrines diving, kites catching bait in mid air, le Harry Potter owl swooping, a secretary bird taken for a walk, it was 45 mins of amazement.  We were very very happy customers.  If we were able we would have stayed for more shows, but time was marching on.

We got the bus and train back to the hotel, had showers etc, then headed out for tea at 7pm (we are getting better at being European!) found ourselves a restaurant on the other side of the rail tracks which was way cheaper.  Was a Turkish establishment - we decided on a bottle of rosé...it was Turkish rosé, our first wine in France wasn't French - arghhhhh!  Anyway we had a good dinner - Matt had Merguez sausages - he was served a plate with 8 - he was very very happy!  Huge pizza for Tom (he couldn't finish it) and chicken wings and frites for me. 

We then wandered back into the veux ville of Colmar - for another look around, we found much more to it, we thought it might empty out of tourists at night - oh no, it was buzzing.  We found some glaces and stayed until after 10pm, enjoying the vibe.  

Took our aching feet back to the hotel, watched France score 2 goals agains Morocco in the World Cup and went to bed.