We had seven days of hot but beautiful riding. Much of the route followed the canals: the Canal de Garonne from Bordeaux to Toulouse, and the Canal du Midi from Toulouse to Carcassonne. That gave us a good bit of shade. Still, we had to start breakfast as early as possible so we could reach the next stop before the worst of the afternoon heat.
The other couple on this ride were Deb and Randal, a pair of like-minded geeks from Minnesota. Both are engineers around our age, so we got along famously. They’d been on many Freewheeling tours before — their 15th, I believe, versus only our third — and knew our guide Norbert from Vienna well from previous trips.
Day one took us from Latresne, just outside Bordeaux, to Les Esseintes. We had a quick lunch in the little town of Sauveterre-de-Guyenne and then pedaled on to our hotel, the Maison des Quatre Saisons, a lovely place run by Delphine. It’s in Les Esseintes, perched atop a hill in the middle of nowhere — beautifully situated. It also has a swimming pool that, despite its 31°C water temperature, was quite refreshing.
Leave a Reply