Montpellier to Le Ruble
Trip Start
Jun 24, 2008
1
21
41
Trip End
Aug 28, 2008
Montpellier,
France
Tuesday, July 22, 2008
Peter had a bath which made his knee feel much better and then a lovely breakfast at the hotel. Gerda and Jan-Erik had of course been for a long walk. Such energy.
Peter was keen to see what the beaches were like south of Montpellier, It took us some time to find, a few wrong turns and misdirection's by our 'lady' and co-drivers. When we did find them it was well worth while. We were driving a long a new road, running along a lovely golden sandy beach, they were busy putting fences up to hold the sand. It went on for ages, there seemed to be a lot of work going on. Then the road turned towards the beach and continued along the waterfront, there were lots and lots of campervans parked along the road. We parked and walked down to the water, very few people on the beach, a few hundred meters between each lot. The water was very clear, but cooler than Antibes. It was a lovely sand and crushed shell beach. We continued along the beach for several miles. Campervans parked all the way. As we neared Cap de Adge we saw a couple of cafes
Leaving Montpellier
. Then as we were coming into Cap de Adge several camping grounds, the hotel and holiday homes, We tried to get right out on the Cap but kept getting lost among residential streets. It was getting close to 1pm and we thought we'd better head for Carcassonne before all the lunch places closed. It was a good hours drive there going at 130km on the motorway. Like the other places we had visited, it had changed, not the place itself, but the amount of people, instead of one carpark, was there 4 or 5 and all full. In the end we were dropped off and Jan-Erik went off in search, as usual he got lucky and the nearest one opened up.
It was now a matter of pushing ourselves through the crowds on the narrow streets, it was packed, we found the little square where we had eaten 5 years ago, not sure if there were more restaurants, but certainly more tables, and all seemed very full. We decided to try the first one, and they very obligingly joined 2 tables for us. Prices were quite reasonable. The boys had Cassoulet Maison. A local specialty, a bean, meat and sausage casserole, it arrived piping hot. Gerda had a mussel and pasta dish. I had a hot goats cheese salad, not very much goats cheese.
The land after Carcassonne was pretty flat, with hills in the distance, and lots of sunflower fields, some apple orchards, some covered in nets.
After lunch we spilt up, Gerda and Jan-Erik did a fast walk through town while Peter and I did a slow meander.
The Beach south of Montpellier
The Castle and town is still fascinating, but so many more restaurants and shops, that it had lost some of it's charm.It was now off to Le Ruble as fast as we could, it was already 3.30 and we had about 170km to go. Motorway all the way to north of Toulouse, we had asked for the fastest way, which took us a different route from what we expected. Once we were off the motorway, we were very pleased we had the GPS, as it would have been hard to follow the map initially as there were so many roads crossing each other.
The sunflower fields continued, never seen so many sunflowers most in full bloom but some still coming into bloom. Once we left the motorway and headed west towards Le Ruble, the countryside change into lovely rolling country, still lots and lots of sunflowers.
We had now trouble finding our Château. It looked lovely, the Danes had arrived before us, which was great as they could give us a tour, of the winding staircases and all the rooms. All the rooms were really large and lots of bathrooms too. Sparsely furnished. An enormous kitchen with 4 tables put together to make a large one.
Before we really settled in, we had to go shopping there was a supermarket not far away, so we set of to buy what ever we needed for dinner and breakfast. It was a little bit cloudy so not very hot. Still warm enough to sit outside to all hours and talk and drink.
