Today I adopted my usual practice when visiting a new city, and just walked. I didn't seek out any special sites or galleries or whatever, I just wandered and tried to soak up the atmosphere of the place.
And this is a lovely city, one in which I immediately feel comfortable. Quite cosmopolitan, with significant Spanish and Turkish communities, but very French. Excellent public transport, with a superb modern tram system: how I wish that some UK cities had the imagination and determination to implement something similar. Very charming, too: a combination of grand 19th century boulevards
and much narrower, sometimes older, back streets that occasionally surprise you with another one of these:
The French take on the English pub is surprisingly fashionable here, there's a Charles Dickens, a Frog and Rosbif (see what they did there?), a Sweeney Todd, a Dog & Duck... . They aren't all about the tourist trade, either; when I had an excellent pint of locally-brewed pale ale in the Frog and Rosbif the clientele was overwhelmingly young, and local. The barmaid, however, was from Darlington, via Halifax, and had been in Bordeaux for ten years. I doubt if she'll be throwing her weight behind the Brexit campaign.
Now, if you've stayed with me this far I realise that you may feel you've had a surfeit of ecclesiastical architecture, so I'll keep those pictures to a minimum. It's not easy to get good shots of the major churches anyway, they're too hemmed-in by the surrounding buildings. However, I was interested that the two major churches - Bordeaux Cathedral and the Basilisque St Michel - both had massive campaniles separate from, and I suspect later than, the main buildings. And in the Cathedral they have in a couple of places restored the decor to something close to its original colours.
This got me thinking. The ancient churches with which I grew up had been stripped back to the bare stone by time and, to a lesser extent, by the protestant reformation. As a result they were, and are, austere. The image of religion that they present is essentially puritanical, and stern, and much more about fear than joy. It's interesting to reflect on how different an impression might have been created by these places when they were new, and glowing with red and gold.
Altogether very pleased to have spent a little time here, I'll be back. And this has been a superbly timed stop as far as the weather is concerned, because today has been cold, and blustery, and intermittently wet. Fine for walking around town, wouldn't have been so great on the bike. Sunshine forecast for tomorrow.
1 comment:
Yes, interesting about how colourful church interiors were in the UK. I've noticed that in increasing numbers of our mediaeval churches the layers of paint and in some cases plaster have been lifted to reveal scenes of heaven and hell - most recent one in Stratford. Earlier point about the warehouses on the river. Find it interesting that rather than bottle locally, producers shipped in cask to London and especially Bristol for bottling there. Same in Oporto and Jerez, hence Harvey's of Bristol. One of the nicest bottles of Burgubdy I ever enjoyed had been bottled in Bristol in the late 60s.
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