Sarlat At Last

June 12: Our train took off from Gare de Montparnasse at a very reasonable 10:08. We had a last breakfast at the cafe down the street, where Cindy caught up on the news.

🤣🤣

Our reserved first class seats to Bordeaux-St. Jean were comfortable, but the experience getting to them was fraught. The Montparnasse station is huge and hard to navigate as a first-timer. The worst part was that they didn't announce our platform until about ten minutes before takeoff--which meant that hundreds of people were dashing down the platform all at once trying to find their correct coach. Cindy and I panicked at the last minute and boarded a coach a couple short of where we were going. Thus, we had to drag our luggage through a big group of young men who were clearly a team of something and needing guidance from their coaches/chaperons. We finally made it to our seats after cramming our luggage into an overstuffed luggage area.

At Bordeaux, we managed to get onto the correct regional (no reservations), and the trip through the countryside was beautiful--actually it looked kind of like our Midwest.

From the train window

Upon our arrival at the Sarlat-la-Caneda station, our Airbnb host was there to pick us up. A moment of panic when we all realized that she speaks about as much English as we do French. Communication would be challenging, but that's what translation apps are for (thank heavens). Here was the view from our window:

We were a 15-minute walk from the center of Sarlat, so we set out almost immediately to check it out. We had a mission as well, and it turned out to be more difficult than we expected. We had to call the canoeing place to confirm our reservation for the next day. I was having problems with my phone's capability for international calls (my fault back in May; I made a bad choice about how to set that up), so we really needed to find someone who could make a call for us. 'Twasn't easy, but we managed to get the help of a young realtor--along with translation apps for both parties--who made the needed call and confirmed that we did indeed have a reservation for the next day. After stopping at a shop and buying a little thank-you gift for the young woman who had helped us--and delivering it to her--we then found our way to this beautiful medieval town!

Our first discovery: the Dordogne Valley seems to be the center of both foie gras and truffles. Everywhere we went we could purchase (if we wanted) these items. We didn't want...

Sarlat's old town was a medieval, enchanting maze of wonderment. We had initially thought we were in a sort of struggling small rural town, but we were very wrong. One turn off the Main Street, and we were in another world.

People live in this 14th century town; all throughout the little alleyways and streets we saw mailboxes , heard conversations, and generally encountered signs of contemporary life. This is another UNESCO World Heritage Site (as is Bath, visited earlier).

We made it to a large center plaza that held a number of restaurants. It was at this point that we met up with the European slower way of living. It was about 6pm and we thought we'd have dinner and then walk back to our place. Hah! There was no food service anywhere for another hour (7pm) at the earliest. If we wanted coffee, or wine, no problem. But food??--nope!

So of course we sat and had a glass of wine to wait till dinner time. And at some point, before the magic hour had arrived, the server took pity on us and brought us some delicious pasta. We were happy campers, and ready to wend our way back to our latest home away from home. But first, a couple more images from that first day of exploring:

Our first supper place

Cindy's new friend

We saw this on little bronze discs around the town, then this large one--and finally discovered that it represents a salamander, the emblem of Sarlat.

We returned to our place, where it was still not even dusk (loving these long summer evenings) to say good evening to Annick, our host, who was entertaining friends on her patio. Because this place is really in the country, we heard birds we'd never heard before. We're accustomed to the Eurasian blackbird--that bird is everywhere and has the sweetest song! But here, at Annick's place, we heard so many more! It was truly a lovely place to be.

And the next morning, when we rose, we walked down to Annick's patio where she served us the most awesome breakfast: tea and coffee, fresh croissants and bread, homemade jams, fresh fruit, yogurt, orange juice--out in the open air with the birds singing up a storm--just a true slice of heaven on earth. (Annick, by the way, is only the second Airbnb host we've encountered who actually is on site and who offers breakfast.)

And then we were off to town again, to meet up with the canoeing organization. And that's another chapter, soon to come.

This is the driveway to Annick's beautiful place.

I don't know if this will work, but I'm inserting a link of the birds that I recorded on the morning of the 13th: https://1drv.ms/u/s!AhTlOJrHOPO75DA2j5hganGSef7y

I'll be interested in seeing if you can access this...

Till the next chapter!