Day 2 - Monday

We came down to breakfast to the pleasant discovery that it wasn’t raining. After a short drive in the van, we found our horses already saddled and bridled, tied to a wall on the castle grounds where they had been left. Soon we were underway.

It got warmer and warmer as we rode through vineyard after vineyard. At first we were going mostly up, on small roads, dirt paths for the vineyard vehicles and on open grass in the vineyards themselves.  We did some walking, some trotting, a bit of cantering. Horses as enthusiastic as ever. After we passed a chateau d’eau – water tower – we started going down. 


The soil around the vine plants was more clay and less gravel than yesterday, though the plants were, as yesterday, in autumn colors; some harvested and some not. Signs of the harvest were everywhere.

Lunch was – where else? – at a lovely wine chateau, the Chateau Guionne. Don’t look for it at your local wine merchant, their wines aren’t even sold in Paris. After tying up, watering and feeding the horses around the corner, we had another fine picnic – roast chicken, salad, paté, cheese course. 

With a bubbly aperitif whose name I forget that is made from the sediment of the wine and then the Bordeaux we carry with us and then some of the Bordeaux made by the chateau.  For some incredible reason, after that the four of us decided to spread out our waterproof jackets and take a nap on the lawn in the increasingly warm sun.

Upon awakening, it was time for – you guessed it – a winetasting! We sipped two local rosés, one of which I really liked, and a couple of reds. Maybe it was three. But the thing is, Bordeaux just doesn’t taste right at 4 p.m. with no food. I haven’t liked a single red we have tasted so far, probably for that reason. But I may buy some of the rosé when the proprietors come through Paris for a festival in December.

Then it was back on the horses for another two hours of riding, faster this time. See here for a video of our start. The terrain was less vineyard and more forested, except when we were going through town. We also passed several establishments demonstrating why French poultry is better than American poultry.

We did a lot of trotting and cantering. My horse, an Anglo-Arab named Ankou, was as always a really energetic, enthusiastic mover. In fact she was getting a little too close to the horse in front of her in line and I decided to try to train her to keep her distance by using my seat and legs and a little rein and all that stuff I had been taught to do. To no avail. Then Sarah happened to mention that Ankou was 23 and I decided to stop trying.

At about 6:30 we arrived at our very simple chambre d’hote, set out in the country with a pasture for the horses. 

After getting cleaned up we had a lovely meal (with four other guests around a dining-style table) of salad with roast goat cheese and apples, then roast breast of duck. And a cheese course. To drink: Did you have any doubts? A nice rosé and then a red, both from the 5-hectare spread of the now-retired proprietor. And so to bed.