Bordeaux

Here we are in the centre of the wine universe. What could be more perfect? We drove over 400 k.m. here from the Loire valley and it was a breeze (for me!), Jess took the wheel and flew down the A10 to Bordeaux past all the sedans pulling monster camper trailers... has anyone heard of a Ford F150 here?? Nothing like a 150hp Citreon pulling a trailer, anyhow the Mercedes smoked them.

Things got a little complicated when we arrived in Bordeaux. The street here are super narrow (like not designed for cars, more horse and carriage or man pushing a cart) and despite our GPS we could not get to the driveway of our hotel, we kept driving up streets and running into dead ends with barricades (every street had a barricade). We would reverse 100m and try another street to no avail. We were 100 m from the hotel but could not figure out how to get to it.

Bordeaux has this most interesting form of "traffic light". See this barricade I am sitting on...


When you drive up to it it magically submerges into the ground and you drive over it. Now, who the hell would have know that... Jess and I drove around in circles and backwards through the narrow streets of Bordeaux as crowds would gather while we tried to turn our full size beast of a car around with world war III brewing inside the car...it was not pretty.

Anyhow, we arrived at the hotel where they told us to just push the button on the post and the barricade would lower (obviously!!! grrrr!!!).

Anyhow, we are staying at the Regent Grand Bordeaux. This is truly a Grand hotel... old world glamour... just the way I like them!! Perhaps not up to FS standards but a really nice place. We subscribed to the "Magtio" philosophy of booking the cheapest room in the nicest hotel in town and our room is gorgeous but this time, you could fit it in a shoe box.



As I am writing this Jess just woke up from a nap and gave the bed and sheets 100% approval, best on the trip so far....yeah!
TV channels are tricky in France. They obviously air in French and the only ones who air in English are BBC and CNN (who repeat the news....I hear Michael Jackson just died!) but best of all about this hotel they have a Mens Fashion Channel... missed the latest shows from Paris Fashion Week but no fears, we can watch them here! Nothing like a little soft core porn in the afternoon.

After checking in we went for lunch at the hotel Brasserie overlooking the square. The food was delicious and our sandwiches had the crust cut off just like Celine and Naomi Campbell like it!!

There is a shop that sells chocolate and macaroons outside the hotel. This is going to be the death of us.

Don't think think this chocolate stiletto is not going to be sitting by my bedside for me to nosh on one night with a tall glass of milk to go with it. I will be in heaven!

After lunch we took a stroll through the streets of Bordeaux and along the river. A very pretty city but one would almost think they were in Italy instead of France at times. We will have to figure out why that is.




One thing we are loving about this city is the bathrooms. Get this...no charge.. you get in, do your thing, and when you get out it locks and completely cleans itself before the next person gets in. You can hear it whirring away between visitors. A germaphobes dream.

We are currently deciding what to do for dinner. We have to meet our wine guide at 8am tomorrow for a private tour of the most prestigious wines of Le Medoc and want to pick a a couple special bottles to savor together in the coming years. I think it is a good thing we are going with someone or if left to our own devices, it might end up looking something like this: