Day 1 -- Sunday

Our riding today really began with a dinner last night at our starting point of Listrac-Medoc, during which we met the members of our group. The only other guests in addition to Sue and me were a German couple, Hermann and Dorothee, perhaps a bit older than us. Plus our host and guide, Pierre Chemineau, and his assistant, Sarah. It was Sarah and Pierre’s wife, Nicole, who picked us up at the Bordeaux train station.

Also at dinner at the lovely-but-simple inn were 9 Finnish women, all of firm skin and fair face, who were just finishing up a weeklong ride with Pierre, doing the reverse route of what we were going to do. So when they said the hotels got better and better along the way our hearts sank. But we had a great dinner of mushroom omelets (it’s mushroom season here) and fletan, which, like all unknown French fishes, translates as, white fish. In this case, in an excellent sauce. Anyway, the Finnish ladies had had a great time, which encouraged us for the future.

                                                                                                                                              

Also fortunately, we had known it was going to rain today, so we were all kitted out in  full rain gear when Pierre picked us up.

The horses were waiting, already saddled by Sarah, at a nearby barn.

 It took only a short time to get going. Dorothee, a beginner, was a bit uncertain but Pierre put her on a calm horse and all seemed well. The horses in general were of high quality and the equipment also.

We set off and immediately were in the vineyards of Medoc. Field after field of red-turning leafy vines. Some fields had been harvested already, others still had luscious bunches of blue grapes clustered at the bottom. Rain was falling, but not very hard.

We did some walking and trotting and then a short canter; all seemed well, even for Dorothee. But a bit later, we were cantering again next to a woods and some small animal came out and scared Pierre’s horse (a newbie being broken in). He made a shy to the right and all the other horses followed suit. Dorothee made it through the initial jump, but lost a stirrup and eventually came off. Bruised and shaken, she nonetheless got back on.

We continued on through more vineyards and small roads and eventually came to the ferry across the Gironde River, near Lamarque (where the British had built a chateau to guard the region during the Hundred Years War.) There, Sarah had parked the van and trailer and laid out a picnic. 

French-style: kir and peanuts for starters, then carrot soup (heated on a burner) and tomato, corn, carrot and cheese salad. Oh, and a jar of incredible pate. By then we were into the Bordeaux, of course. I was just thinking I couldn’t eat or drink any more when she brought out the cheese course.

(The horses, by the way, were tied to a portable line under a tree near the parking area and happily noshed their nosebags).

After lunch, what else? A visit to a local wine chateau, accompanied by tasting. As Sue said, “After all, it’s been 20 minutes since we had any wine.” So Sarah drove us to the Chateau Maucaillou (‘Bad Rock,’ as in, don’t plant any vines here). We had a nice visit of the facilities (there were maybe 10 other people), a tasting of a mediocre wine and a trip around the museum.




Then back to the riverbank, where we, to the delight of the other passengers, led the horses onto the car ferry. Many people snapped photos of us and wanted to pat the horses, which was exciting since they were a bit unnerved.

After about half an hour we landed in the city of Blaye. Almost as soon as we got off the ferry and mounted (Dorothee was feeling a bit undone so slept in the van while Sarah took her horse) we walked into town, looked up and saw the Citadelle de Blaye, a huge fortress that had first been built, like, some real long time ago and then reinforced by the Marquis de  Vauban in, say, the 1600s. As we turned left toward it, I called out to Pierre in a really clever joke: “Are we going to visit the citadel on horseback?” He just gave a little smile and turned up the cobbled path leading to the long, narrow uphill bridge across the moat, us clopping behind him.

See this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0NFzH70tYHU for a movie version.

And indeed, we walked all through the grounds, looked out over the Gironde – a very wide estuary at this point  – and saw most of the ramparts.

Then we left through a different exit and walked down to a broad field where, it turned out, the horses would spend the night. In very little time, Sarah had a portable electric fence strung around an area of maybe 300 square feet and the horses had been watered (buckets we carried from a nearby stream) and had their nosebags.

We stayed at a fairly charming (in the sense of, no hot water) local hotel in Blaye and had a nice meal at a nearby restaurant. 




                    




Sarah was with us while Pierre stayed with the horses; the trailer was fitted out with sleeping quarters.