88km. Details
If you're ever roaming around the Gironde, do yourself a favour and spend a night at the Hotel La Citadelle in Blaye. Rooms not especially luxurious, but perfectly adequate. Nice restaurant and terrace bar. Swimming pool. Sensational views of the estuary. But its distinguishing feature is that when it says citadel, it really means it. It is smack in the middle of the Citadel at Blaye, a historic monument on a vast scale.
La Porte Royale
This photograph doesn't do it justice. It is taken from inside the external fortifications, and shows the main entrance to the citadel proper. The thing is a kilometre long. and covers 38 hectares. Inside it there's the ruin of a 14th century castle that looks about the size of a shed by comparison. The hotel is in what seems to have been part of the headquarters building, next to the monastery (!) that was built to give the soldiers access to the consolations of religion. Extraordinary, fascinating place, and I'm in it entirely at random having decided to stop riding at 1400 rather than continue for another 50 km into Bordeaux.
Vineyards everywhere I looked on the ride today, kilometre after kilometre of them. A surprisingly large number of them were devoted to making Pineau and Cognac rather than wine. Some of the wine-makers do alright, though. These are the sort of premises that owning a really top vineyard in the Gironde will buy you:
Chateau Segonzac
The vines are just coming into leaf. It seems amazing that in the space of only about four months they are transformed from what look like dead twigs and will be groaning under the weight of the grapes. Strange business, life.
Bordeaux tomorrow, followed by a rest day. Having left myself only 50 km into town, I'll easily be there by lunchtime, and so will have a full day and a half to explore the city.
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