Sylvie's Travels Home

October 4, 2023

Breakfast was included this morning and we met up at 8am. We had croissants, baguette, cheese, fresh fruits, fresh orange juice and café au lait. All delicious. Folco, our host told the Bickfords a little bit of the house’s history which started as the home of Cardinal Orsini, 700 years ago and was a house of ill-repute for a while. It has been in Folco’s family for 3 generations.

We left at 9am and drove Bob and Heather to the train station to start their journey home. It was sad to see them go as we had such a great time together.

Unfortunately they took the wrong train and had to pay 180 euros more than the 88 euros they had already spent. At least, the train was going to Paris. They arrived at 1pm.

We started our long 5 1/2 hours drive to our next destination Vezac. We did a detour to see the Pont de Gard, a Unesco heritage site since 1985. The Pont is a roman aqueduct built 2000 years ago and used for 5 centuries to bring water to the city of Nîmes.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pont_du_Gard

We arrived at the Manoir de la Malartrie in Vezac, in the Dordogne region, by 4:30pm, after driving through narrow countryside roads for the last 45 minutes. Ooafaa and Daniel, the owners for the last 16 years, greeted us and showed us around the beautiful 19th century property, including a rooftop, pool, gorgeous gardens, water fountains and pathways, one leading to the gardens of the Château Marqueyssac. The manoir has only 5 bedrooms. Our bedroom with a view of the pool, had actually 2 rooms. The second room had 2 more beds and the bathroom….without a toilet. I finally found it in a big closet at the end of the second room. We have had more accommodations with the toilet being in a room of its own.

We had decided coming here because of reading about one of the most beautiful village of France called la Roque Gageac. They didn’t lie. The village was jaw dropping gorgeous!

Pogo droned for a while from the terrace of our hotel and later on in town. I walked around the gardens and I probably took over 100 pics. Everywhere I looked felt like a fairytale.

Luckily I was able to make a reservation to La Belle Étoile, a recommendation from our hostess. I think it was my best meal yet. Besides all the amuse-gueules they brought us, my escargots and lamb were outstanding. Pogo was really happy with his meal as well. We shared a bottle of Pouilly Fuissé.

We walked back home in the dark but still continued taking pictures.

Here’s a link about the region:

https://frenchmoments.eu/la-roque-gageac/

The hotel had books everywhere so I decided to borrow a Tintin for old times sake.