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Day trips from La Rochelle
We will have 4 days in La Rochelle on a trip in September. Intend to go to some favorite spots on Ile de Re one of those days, and spend a day in La Rochelle itself. Would like recommendations for one or two more day trips. Considering Niort, Saintes and Rochefort Comments on these and/or suggestions of others much appreciated.
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All of those would be nice. Nantes might be worth considering if you want a larger city. Les Machines de l’île with the mechanical Elephant is kind of fun:
https://www.lesmachines-nantes.fr/en...rand-elephant/ |
You might want to check out Ile d'Oléron for a look at Ile de Re's "poor cousin." I loved the week we spent there several years ago.
I like, but am not a big fan of, the inland venues from La Rochelle, except that there is some extraordinary seafood in some of the nameless towns just south of it on the beach. If you have only 4 days I wonder why you wouldn't just want to spend them in La Rochelle itself and Ile de Ré. I wouldn't feel any compunction to move around a lot. |
I’d totally agree with StCirq. I’d spend all your time in La Rochelle and Ile de Re, they are the shining stars of the area. What’s your route to Bordeaux? |
Sorry, I lost track of this thread when we left for a trip to Northern Spain. Thanks for your comments and suggestions. DH will love the idea of just staying in La Rochelle and Ile de Re and not moving around so much.
Jpie, we move onto Nantes for a final day on the trip before returning home. I am very excited about seeing lesmachines. We saw the merry go round when it was on loan to Paris several years ago and I was smitten. Can't wait to see the other contraptions. Looks amazing. |
We are currently in The Charente. Most of the locals are tutting when we mention a trip to La Rochelle because of the traffic, September should be better. I have to say, I was there in the first week of May and it was very busy. We went to Cap Ferret last Monday. The seafood was literally straight off the boat in a stunning shabby chic restaurant. Then came the traffic, we crawled round Bordeaux for an hour. We are really enjoying our time here, very understated place (South of Cognac), good food and lots of little magical places. We are walking from our rental farmhouse, through vines, on no roads to the bakery every morning, how French is that! |
Sounds delightful. We will fly into Bordeaux and travel by train rather than car so should not have difficulty with parking. The Cap Ferret fresh seafood sounds spectacular. Our time there will be Sept. 5 to 10 in Bordeaux, then 11th to 14 in La Rochelle and the 15th and 16th in Nantes before flying home on the 16th. Hope the re-entry occurs before we get there and that we will be able to navigate without terrible crowds. Thanks for your suggestions. If you could send the name of the Cap Ferret restaurant I would be much obliged.
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https://www.tripadvisor.com/Restaura...Aquitaine.html We ate here. Just a lifetime experience. Not the Grand Canyon or Leaning Tower but still one of those things you should do.......IF you like seafood. Do you have a car in Bordeaux? Do you like wine? |
I'm partial to the Romanesque churches of the Charente:
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That’s the fascination in churches for me. The little detail and the stories behind them. Lots of them here. Yesterday, we visited this one https://www.theguardian.com/travel/2...nights-templar I’ve always been fascinated by The Templars, just a great story of history and wonderful conspiracy theories. Dan Brown’s book was awful, the film was awful and the theory has been around for centuries. Brown’s genius was weaving the story into our contemporary context where institutional religion is suffering terrible publicity. |
BTW the church is one of the few surviving Templar churches in France in any sort of repair. |
Originally Posted by BritishCaicos
(Post 16952800)
https://www.tripadvisor.com/Restaura...Aquitaine.html We ate here. Just a lifetime experience. Not the Grand Canyon or Leaning Tower but still one of those things you should do.......IF you like seafood. Do you have a car in Bordeaux? Do you like wine? |
Hi Julie Would you absolutely rule out hiring a car? Cap Ferret is an upmarket (but busy) seaside area and lot like Cap Cod. I’m not sure about links with public transport. Archachon has a different vibe a little more “average” holiday resort. With a car, you could complete what has to be one of the world class day trips. From Bordeaux, drive out to Margaux then to Pauillac, maybe as far as Saint Estephe. Then back down to Larmarque and take the lovely little ferry over to Blaye. Through the vineyards there and onto Bourg, Pomeroy and Saint Emilion. You’ll be on the doorstep of most of Europe’s top 20 reds, arguable whether these are the world’s best reds. There’s endless scope for tasting and the Chateaux properties are generally stunning. Ive done this circuit twice in the past two months, once by bicycle and then by car. Traffic within the Bordeaux ring road is a biblical battle, once you leave the city then there isn’t much on the road. |
We have traveled through the wine areas of Bordeaux years ago by car and enjoyed it thoroughly but getting out of Bordeaux to repeat that journey would prove pretty daunting now. I'll do some research on getting to Cap Ferret from Arcachon by rental car of taxi though. It sounds like a very worthy goal.
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Just FYI, if you do decide to rent a car from Bordeaux-it is easy from the train station as there is a tram station right in front of the train station and it will put you on the side of town that will get you the right direction quickly.
Also you might check out the French rideshare website www.blablacar.fr My nieces and nephews use it all the time to get from one place to another. You will need to having a working cell phone in order to connect though. If you look at the site right now looking a few days out there are people offering rides from Bordeaux to Cap Ferret for 5 euros. There won't be as many offers in September, but there probably will people going to Archachon for example. And if you sing up on the site you can create an alert to let you know if there are any rides for the date you want going to or near your destination. |
Julie, there's a decent train connection from Bordeaux St-Jean to Arcachon, and once there there are minibuses that will take you around the area to Pylat and Cap Ferret and so forth (google will turn them up).
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I do remember that there were lots and lots of TransGironde buses around the Medoc and Cap Ferret. I know that doesn’t help much but Cap Ferret is very linear in its geography and picking up the buses from each area to another didn’t seem to be an issue. |
Take the boat excursion to Fort Boyard. It might not mean much to you but it is an impressive building sitting way out in the water. Quite a few people from all over the world are excited to see it, though, since the adventure game show that is filmed there has 35 different international versions and more than 70 countries broadcast the show, even when it is the version from a different country.
This report that I made 2 years ago shows my trip there: La Rochelle 2017 | Any Port in a Storm |
As usual, this site and its posters are fantastic. So many ideas and so much information make me now sure that we can work something out to get to Cap Ferret. Thanks so much to all of you. I'm off to read kerouac's report. Fun way to start a day.
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In that case, I will also recommend the aquarium in La Rochelle if that sort of thing interests you. It is one of the best in France.
Aquarium de La Rochelle | Any Port in a Storm |
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