Monday, August 25, 2014

Dordogne

We drove from Beaune to Mont Dore close to Clermont Ferrand and spent a night there. It is a beautiful place surrounded by old volcanoes I believe. Husband and son went to Puy de Sancy for the views.


Mont Dore

Puy du Sancy







The morning after we drove to the Dordogne, to our camping in Carsac.

There are always plenty of things to do there. One morning we visited Beynac castle, then we had lunch at les Pres Gaillardou, a restaurant by the road.

The appetizers were a salade de lentilles tiede with gesiers confits, for me and husband and son chose the terrine. All excellent choices.


My favorite foie gras stand at the market in St Cyprien.






Views from Beynac castle.









The wine was divine Le temps est venu. The mains were duck confit for the 3 of us.








Followed by mousse au chocolat and a vanilla ice cream for our son. We had a chat with the waiter, he was really nice to our son. Two french families were there at lunch and both groups knew the owner and the waiter. We were the only tourists. Everything was very good, but the wine was exceptional.

We also ordered a pizza to go from our favorite place by the road on one occasion.

A pizza with chorizo for our son and a pizza pissaladiere for us. This is not a pissaladiere as you can find in Provence, but a pizza with anchovies, onions, very delicious.





A pastry store in Sarlat is selling among delicious pastries oranges confites in chocolate simply spectacular.

Sunday, August 3, 2014

Beaune, Bourgundy

After our stay in Alsace we drove to Burgundy and stopped to visit Savigny les Beaunes castle and museum. My husband and son were surprised when we stopped at the castle, as it stated 80 airplanes, they just couldn't believe it. We then visited the house with race cars and motorcycles, then tractors and field machinery and then wow, there were the 80 airplanes in one part of the garden. They were overwhelmed with joy and surprise. Then all the floor inside the castle was dedicated to miniature airplanes. There were thousands of them, just incredible.











We then drove to our hotel in Beaune, Au grand St-Jean, where we left our car and walked around to visit Beaune and have a diner at Brasserie Le Carnot with Boeuf Bourguignon and a pizza for our son and a very good wine. Our hotel had just delightful family with kids at the reception, and we received a very warm welcome any time we entered or leaved the hotel.





Haut Koenigsberg and Riquewihr

In the morning we drove to Haut Koenigsberg to visit the castle. The views were beautiful there. My husband had hard time parking the car on the slope because this car has a small plastic handle not too useful as a hand break.





As we walked he decided to walk back and to leave more space in front of the car for when we finish the visit. Laguna is big for Europe.




We finally didn't have a problem to get out at the end of the visit. The castle is worth a visit.
We then drove to Riquewhihr for lunch and sat at the Auberge Alsacienne. I ordered a choucroute again, my husband decided to try a baeckeoffe with meat, potatoes cooked in a wine, and our son ordered a flammkuchen (tarte flambee).






Riquewhihr is beautiful, but felt more touristy than Kaysersberg although it wasn't too busy on the day of the visit. After lunch we walked around and bought some souvenirs.

On our last day in Alsace we drove to Mulhouse to Cite du Train for a visit. We used audio guides for our visit. The museum is big and has animated miniature train at the end of the visit.