{"id":527,"date":"2018-10-11T17:44:44","date_gmt":"2018-10-11T17:44:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/?p=527"},"modified":"2026-08-18T19:59:42","modified_gmt":"2026-08-18T19:59:42","slug":"euro-travellers-2018-15","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/?p=527","title":{"rendered":"EURO-TRAVELLERS 2018. 15"},"content":{"rendered":"

15\u00a0 EAR BUGS, AMERICANS AND ST. EMILION<\/strong><\/p>\n

Part 14 was never issued – but NOBODY noticed!\u00a0 Is there a hint there?<\/p>\n

I just wish that the photos that I add carefully in the right order would stay where I put them!\u00a0 Still, untangling them gives you something to think about!<\/p>\n

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Another view of our old chateau.<\/span><\/p>\n

It’s Sunday afternoon and I’ve just had to carry out a surgical procedure on Glenda.\u00a0 A tiny bug had decided to get out of the sun by sheltering in her right ear. She could feel it (and hear it) tromping around in her lug-hole.\u00a0 Not a nice feeling!\u00a0 It was well out of sight but my medical training with the cub scouts came to the rescue.\u00a0 Blow into the ear.\u00a0 Second time successful. Lucky, because the only other treatment I remember from my scouting days 60 years ago involved a marlin spike.\u00a0 But thinking about it, that was probably more to do with getting stones out of horses hooves!<\/p>\n

But I’ve missed a day.\u00a0 Saturday.\u00a0 Shortly after we arrived in Rauzan, a Czech camper van had rolled in opposite onto a pitch that we wondered if we should have gone onto because it had loads of shade. And in 30+ degrees you do need a bit of shade. Anyway, the pesky Czechs have collared it!\u00a0 It later turned out that the Czechs were actually citizens of Buffalo in Trumpland.\u00a0 Hi Glen and Ann!<\/p>\n

As they hadn’t had any alternative but to hire a camper, we took pity on them. They weren’t REAL camper-vanners!\u00a0 We unloaded the car and turned it back into a four-seater for the first time in weeks.\u00a0 All four of us then took off for a visit to St \u00c9milion.<\/p>\n

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Views of St Emilion.<\/span><\/p>\n

Afterwards we went on a ticky tour of the vineyard-covered countryside just to the north of the River Dordogne.\u00a0 We stopped at a restaurant – Les Marronniers at Montagne.\u00a0 It had a delightful little shady arbour for a beer and a few pints of cold water!\u00a0 Then the restaurant closed and all the staff went home leaving us in charge.<\/span><\/p>\n

We finished off the tour with a short walk along the north bank of the Dordogne at Castillon la Bataille.\u00a0 It was too hot for much activity but we stopped off at the municipal campsite to “check out the place for next year” (and, coincidentally, for the girls to use the facilities).\u00a0 Home for a swim before the four of us went for yet another birthday celebration meal.\u00a0 This time at La Maison – again.\u00a0 We were the first to arrive and the last to leave.\u00a0 Owner and chef, Christian, and his wife, Sylvie, made us feel really welcome.<\/p>\n

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Ann and Glen helping us celebrate yet another birthday at La Maison.<\/p>\n

As darkness fell, I re-packed the car with all the stuff we’ve hardly used on this trip, covered the chairs and table for the night, brought in the washing, closed down the windows and it started to rain.\u00a0 A short sharp thunderstorm broke our drought and then cleared off to the north.<\/p>\n

Sunday seems to have gone in a heat-haze of laziness.\u00a0 Swimming in the pool followed by lunch (rather un-memorable and over-priced) at Le Caff\u00e9 Cuisine in Branne.\u00a0 It was somewhat pretentious, sadly lacking in choice on the \u20ac30 menu and grossly undercooked on the steak front.\u00a0 And we don’t like fish\/crustacean soups…\u00a0 Anyway, while disliking our soup, we got talking to a couple of ex-pats on the next table who thought the meal was the best thing since sliced bread\u00a0 – so it’s “horses for courses”.\u00a0 We just backed the wrong horse today!<\/p>\n

Our new found friends did impart the news that the French Government, in its wisdom, has lowered the national speed limit from 90 to 80 kph on all but dual-carriageways.\u00a0 Effective today!\u00a0 I wonder if the local lads and lasses will take the same amount of notice of the new limit as they did of the old one!\u00a0 Don’t think we will have much of a problem.\u00a0 We tend to drive about that speed with the caravan in tow or possibly less while meandering around the country lanes without it.\u00a0 If they really want to reduce the number of serious accidents (their stated aim) they should raise the age that young French lads can drive by 10 years (and by 15 for the girls).\u00a0 Clamping down on drink and drug-driving would also help – but they need to leave us non-long-term-Europeans alone as we head home from the restaurants.<\/p>\n

This site is red hot keen on the World Cup Football. Every match is shown in a covered outdoors area near the pool.\u00a0 I have just watched the end of the Spain vs Russia match.\u00a0 At the last minute, after apparently controlling the ball for 75% of the time throughout 120 minutes, the Spaniards managed to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory in the penalty shoot-out.<\/p>\n

On Monday we were reminded just what a dreadful bottleneck is Libourne.\u00a0 A few years ago we just snuck through one stupidly narrowed bridge with about one inch clearance either side of our last caravan.\u00a0 The new one literally won’t go!\u00a0 The traffic calming measures in town are ridiculous and the one way system, the road closures and deviations compound the problem.\u00a0 Mental note – DON’T tangle with Libourne while towing…<\/p>\n

We had gone there today for lunch with Daniel and Myl\u00e8ne his new partner.\u00a0 We first met Daniel in February 2007 in Denmark.\u00a0 That is the TOWN of Denmark in southern Western Australia.\u00a0 Lunch at Le Grand Caf\u00e9 du Lac.\u00a0 Followed by a walk around the lake – originally a gravel extraction pit now a water sports area with a long rowing course.\u00a0 Sadly, the area had been colonised by hundreds of travellers.\u00a0 And they all had magnificent bran new caravans and cars.\u00a0 Some of them protected with anti-gr\u00eale netting.\u00a0 It looked more like an up-market convention of car salesmen or gardeners and gutter-cleaners to the nouveau riche than a horde of wandering folk.<\/p>\n

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Travellers caravans with anti-grele netting.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

15\u00a0 EAR BUGS, AMERICANS AND ST. EMILION Part 14 was never issued – but NOBODY noticed!\u00a0 Is there a hint there? I just wish that the photos that I add carefully in the right order would stay where I put… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-527","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-portugal-2018"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/527","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=527"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/527\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8116,"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/527\/revisions\/8116"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=527"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=527"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=527"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}