Serene Soubès

Yesterday we drove from Bardos to Soubès - in fact Jack had been on a 4 hour round trip to Bilbao before that in order to get his host to an airport not affected by the latest strike.

The country on this side of France is quite different to the West Coast from whence we came, still mountainous, but stony rather than wooded. We're staying at a lovely house with our friends from Adelaide, have been shopping at a local market (well, some fifteen minutes' drive from the house) and gone for a walk into the village.

Down by the riverside

Today our friends had a barbie down by the river on their estate.

Beautiful Biarritz

Not a bad place for a holiday...

Bilbao

We went to Bilbao to see the Guggenheim - the building was amazing from any angle ....

Inside there were 2 exhibitions - Henri Rousseau was great, Anish Kaspoor was crap.

Has it aged well?

On Wednesday we had a nice dinner at a local auberge. They had on display some wine of a fair age - we didn't try any.

Grand designs (cont.)

Our friends' development project includes access to the local river.

The plaque is dated 1783

Bronwen observed one of the artisans working on the project spraying weeds. She asked him if it wasn't dangerous to be doing so without a protective mask. He, an ex New Zealand rugby player who had settled in France many years ago, replied: "Not as dangerous as some of the red wine around here."

Grand Designs

Our friends have bought an 18th century villa near Bardos, which is near Biarritz in Pays Basque. They are renovating it with great creativity and enthusiasm ...

It is of course necessary to have a few goats on the property.