France (2) Day 2

T'was 9am in the morning, and all through our "Gite"
Neither of us was stirring, cause man were we beat
When in our living room, there arose such a clatter
we threw on some clothes to see what was the matter
our host had brought breakfast, piled high on a plate
we beamed joyously, as we munched and we ate
baguettes, rolls, jam, yogurt, fruit, and the like
zipped down our throats, suggesting a hike
But first Julie would sleep and Peter would read,
hours would pass before the hike's call we'd heed
...
We ended up exploring the gite property a bit, and then Julie's womanly urge to do laundry overtook her. We did a load, so that it would be done - ready to hang to dry - by the time we would finish reading. Around 3:30, we struck out to explore the countryside; our first stop: The winery close by that the pizza van dude had recommended. We found it easily, and luckily it was open this fine Sunday. The proprietress was more than happy to pour her wines, although she couldn't stay and chat long: seemingly noble grape stains and smears on her elbows attested to the hard work of grape harvesting and crushing. I had mentioned our love of the Sauternes district, and she let us try her "cooked" wine - they boil the grape juice right after the crush, and then allow the yeast from the air in the winery to begin the fermentation! Quite labor-intensive. The wine was very sweet and pleasant, so we couldn't leave without buying a bottle. On our way out, we asked her for a restaurant recommendation, and she pointed us at Louvradec(?), a short 20min drive away.

Julie discovered she was famished when we arrived, so Peter procured a mozzarella and tomato sandwich from a nearby bakery. We then shopped through the town, discovering enough nick-knacks to fill even the largest of land-fills (guess who's writing this :-) ).



We also tried various olive oils at the local Château - all very interesting and different - but Peter discovered his dislike for massive amounts of oil consumed by itself. Yuck!

Since the local restaurants didn't open until 7:30pm at the earliest, we burned some time by writing post-cards, chatting, and visiting more stores.



Peter especially liked one large modern wine shop, with a nice and large tasting bar. The French girl hardly spoke English, but happily poured a few tasty wines and lambics, two of which we ended up purchasing.



Since the city teemed with restaurants, we asked her for recommendation, and she steered us to the "Michel Angel" restaurant right around the corner. It was ok but not as good as we had been hoping. Our main beef was the lack of an "amuseé-bouche", which everyone else got except for us. How lame is that?! The rest of the food was good, but not exceptional. We did enjoy talking with the other restaurant patrons, and noticed that only one couple there was actually French. The rest of Europe was well represented - Two tables of English people, two of Germans, etc.