The cycle trip has finished and there is a certain warm glow and smugness in achieving 8 days of exercise. This my last supper at the Hostellerie De La Bouriane, Gourdon. It is silver service and the Maître D’ is dressed in a dinner suit and is obviously the ONLY member of staff on duty, indeed is the owner.
I have visions of the episode of “Fawlty Towers” in which Basil attempts a silver service dinner and predictably fails, not only because of Basil, but the chef was intoxicated or was the chef going out as it was previously his rostered night off?
I am reassured by the impressive olde world dining room and the menu, not to mention the Maître D’ who does appear to be in control, although it will be a long evening but worth the wait
The formal dining room
The menu
Entree
La Salade du Moment
This was quite a creation as the apparent mozzarella balls were in fact an iced sorbet like taste but with actual mozzarella.
The last day of a great 8 days of cycling with sublime weather and routes.
This final day was the longest following the valley with a few gentle climbs despite the fearsome elevation graph above. The maximum gain was only 150m.
There were 2 picturesque villages ( although all the villages could be so described) on the day
Saint Pompont
Daglan
A deserted chapel on the road to Daglan
And here is a screen grab of the summary of the trip in total
but wait, there’s more, or as they say at an Apple event… “one more thing….”
here are the summaries of the activities for the week which include
The day dawns bright and sunny with a typical crispness that belies the coming heat ! It’s breakfast and I am the only cock crowing in the hen house – 3 Canadian women I guess in their late 60s are about to set out on much the same tour whilst about 6 Austrian woman who appear to also start a cycle adventure are all set up with brand new ebikes and cycle clothes that suggest they have travelled to Gourdon via Milan.
I am fascinated by the lack of obesity in the French population, given their enjoyment of food and wine! Then the penny dropped – the vast majority still smoke.
However we passed several fields of literally thousands of ducks. I think ducks are to France what lambs are to New Zealand. Around the bend in the country road was a huge factory that manufactured Pate de Fois and every other known way to butcher, press, grind or extrude duck meat into edible offerings. I suspect from the almost snow like appearance of the fields, that a duck down Doona factory would supplement their income…nor to mention fertiliser.
So the point of this preamble is that the factory, much like a wine cellar in the Adelaide Hills was open for tastings, so in I went, to be confronted by a customer who was one of the most obese humans I have even seen and who was adding to his gigantic shopping bag all manner of things “ducky” which cost him at the Check-out out about Euro 100.
This was a delightful ride, which the notes suggested was the shortest of the week but made up by it being the most hilly! It was dead easy! A pleasant cycle less taxing than the ride to Norton Summit and certainly not as arduous as the freeway path . It’s all downhill literally from tomorrow.
The Dordogne seems to specialise food wise in duck and walnuts.
“Canard de Duo” with Chips! The “two” refers to a ducks drumstick and half a breast.
A few pictures of several quaint villages on this first day which turned out to be cloudy with occasional warm spitting rain – a pleasant relief
I arrived from Toulouse by fast SNFC train at 9:30 and met up with Simon who set up the road bike ( new!)
Then Cliff who went through the cycle itinerary- which looks fabulous and I think relatively easy over the week.
Gourdon is a delightful bustling town perched on a hill with castle and church as are all towns and villages. It was also the day of an agricultural show with shiny new machines along the main road
As always, photography is so much better than words and so here are a few pictures of the township
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