Searching the Internet we stumbled across a delightful villa in the Dordogne Valley at La Roque-Gageac called Roquecombe, we chose this area as we had read a biography that was written by an English woman who had bought a vineyard nearby and spent many years establishing it. Books are a great inspiration when traveling and The Ripening Sun lived up to its reputation giving us a great focal point to explore is fabulous setting, The Dordogne.

La Roque- Gageac at night

We thought it was a tourist information exaggeration when we read that there were around 1400 chateaus dotted around the landscape but we soon discovered that it was no exaggeration and would be quite a challenge if you wanted to count just the ones we could see from the roads.

Daniel on the wall at Biron Chateau

It is also the home to many Prehistoric sites and caves with the Moustier cave men (dating back 55000 years) being found nearby. This encouraged us to visit The Roque Saint Christophe, a cave village set 300ft in the cliffs overlooking the Vezere river, these caves have been home to many ancient civilizations from Moustier men 400000 years ago, the Neolithic generations 2600 years BC, it was really interesting to see remnants from so many civilizations in one place.

La Roque St Christophe








Our accommodation at Roquecombe was more than we ever expected and our delightful hosts, Philippe and Anne Marie ensured a pleasant stay.
On Sunday evening our hosts invited us to aperitifs to meet the other guests staying at the other cottages/Gites
Cointha and Daniel were pleased to find out that there was another Australian family an English family and an older Australian couple vacationing in the other units.
Cointha and Daniel had a wonderful time being able to communicate with some other children for a change, and Daniel was enthralled by the football skills (soccer) of the English lad Jamie.
Jamie who is about 13 had us amused as we discovered another involuntary language error
When our poor host Ann Marie who does not have a very good command of English approached him to offer some aperitif in the form of Coca Cola or Orange juice.
On her first attempt she asked Jamie,
Anne Marie: Jamie would you like some drink Cola Juice?
Jamie: Im fine
Anne Marie: Imfine ???? you would like cola? Juice?
Jamie: Im fine thanks
Anne Marie: Imfine ? what is imfine?
Jamie: doesn’t matter
Anne Marie: doesn’t matter ? you want some drink?
Jamie: Im ok
By now poor Anne Marie is bamboozled, she was not prepared for these responses, when offering drinks she was thinking yes/no responses would be easy to understand and as I see her standing there with that same blank look I must have shown on my face a thousand times on this trip. I realise how much we vandalise our language which is fine in Australia as people will generally get the gist of the conversation but to a foreigner, well it explains a lot about the funny terms that I would hear from the Greek, Italian and Turkish immigrants when I was a kid.
THE Dordogne is also famous for its Foie Gras,
A goose liver Pate made special by the fact that the goose was force fed via a long tube stuffed down its neck which supposedly makes the pate taste better. I have eaten lots of nice pates in my life, I see no benefit in me buying pate that has needlessly been produced in this (what I believe to be) cruel way for the sake of my taste buds.
Well we had a wonderful week here and had many good chats down by the pool catching up on all the news we have missed out on while away and swapping travel stories with the other guests.
Roquecombe was a fantastic place to stay and we were treated to a few extras we had not bargained for, meeting some great people, seeing quite a few wild deer in the woods, great day trips to Rocamador, Monpazier, Sarlat and Dom, hot air balloons skimming the trees behind our villa, two great hosts and a king size bed which was unbelievable considering the size of the bed in the motor home.


We returned this week to visit Sheena, Patrick and the gang just outside Lyon and off loaded some stuff Sheena had loaned us during our earlier visit. It was great to catch up again and let the kids have some more French family interaction. Travel can really open your eyes culturally but spending some time with a French family is a wonderful experience that we will all remember for a long time. Sheena and Patrick again made us feel at home and when possible ensured that we had the everyday meals that her family eats.
On the Sunday they had a prior engagement so we headed into Lyon to inspect the produce market and take in a few sights.
You would think that Bruce would have learnt a lesson in Sicily and been very wary about Deb ordering food and drinks in a foreign Language. (I forgot to put this story on the blog then so I will tell it now) While I went off to get some photos developed Deb went to order 3 slices of Pizza and a coffee for her and the kids, when I return there is 1 slice of pizza and 3 espressos (tiny over the top full on shots of coffee). This theme has run its course several times and now we have Lyon to add to the list.
2 bowls of soup de jour please. Deb was so confident that she had got this right as she proudly proclaims, there is not a soup I do not like. Now 2 bowls of soup of the day can be absolutely anything in France and Debs confidence in her choice was completely shattered as the waiter placed the soup in front of us.
2 giant best value for money possible all you can eat bowls of pure beetroot soup----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ice cold complete with ice cubes.
I am told that this is quite a common dish in Poland but that interesting fact is not enough comfort for me to stomach my way though 2 gallons of near frozen purple soup.

No doggy bag thanks

We look at each other and smile and the kids just burst out laughing, I suggest to Daniel that this could be a Mr. Bean moment and that he could pass the ladies handbag from behind him and we can dispose of it there. I don’t know what the other diners must have thought as we sat there joking and laughing yet not eating.
Deb and I pushed the soup in front of the kids and I ordered some tartine which was delicious and was some consolation.
We spent a couple of wonderful days with Sheena’s gang and were treated to a lunch at Les 3 Canards restaurant where Patrick was installing a pool and doing some landscaping. Patrick ordered snails and we were all initiated into the French escargot club.

Cointha about to chew up a snail










After a sad goodbye with Sheena we drove to the outskirts of Paris and boarded a train for Gare de Lyon and then off to the Louvre to view the Mona Lisa, Venus De Milo and the thousands of other art treasures and antiques. No sorry Dan Brown fans we did not do a Davinci code tour. We spent 5 hours wandering the Louvre which was great but a little bit of overload for an 8 year old boy. Catching the metro we set off for Monte Marte where Daniel was treated to more near naked ladies outside the Moulin Rouge, he has definitely had his eyes opened on this trip and we have had a few awkward moments figuring out how to explain a few sights to him.
Back to Gare De Lyon train station, home of Le Train Bleu which was the setting for the Mr Beans Holiday restaurant scene. Like Florian’s in Venice this is a beautiful restaurant but totally unaffordable for mere mortals like us.


La Train Bleu

After 6 months on the road being bamboozled by art, culture, isolation from other children and having to put up with their parents 24/7, Cointha and Daniel finally get their pay off. We are off to Disneyland Paris, so we load up the wallet and fill the back pack with food. Disney Paris is huge and after parking it is a ten minute walk just to get to the gate and half of that was on moving walkways. As we approach the gate we view wonderful floral arrangements shaped in Disney characters and the Disney castle can be seen inside the gate.

Mickey made of flowers

I turn to look at the kids faces to see how excited they are and am very surprised that the most excited was Deb.

Deb all weak at the knees

The funny thing is that children today have not had the same exposure to Disneyland that we had while growing up, sitting down after tea on Sunday nights to watch Mickey, Goofy, Herbie the love bug or Jiminy Cricket. So Deb was quite affected by the whole atmosphere as we walked through the turnstile.

1 day was just enough to do all we needed at Disney, fortunately the weather was not too good which kept the crowds down and the longest we waited for a ride was 45 minutes, although some rides had 1 hour waiting times, they have a special deal there, you can go to both parks in the same day for an extra 10 Euros each, we could not do everything in 1 park on a quiet day so I can’t imagine trying to do 2 parks in 1 day.
The entertainment was great and the Tarzan show quite spectacular as the performers mixed dancing with trampolining and trapeze.
Well that is nearly all for France as we now head for The Netherlands again to visit friends and attend the Baptism of Little Deborah born in April.

The public holiday is over and I have managed to find a hire car so I return to the village to find a mechanic, with a lot of strained linguistics’ we arrange to have the van towed to his shop during siesta so I return to the campground to organise our week.
Little did I know just what was in store for me, we had prepared for the worst, or at least we thought we had.
Around 4000 Euro was more than we were prepared to spend on a 20 year old van so we weighed up the options, all 1 of them as towing it back to England was also to expensive, so I began to source a new home for the van.
As it was an English van nobody wanted it apart from the motor wreckers, though he would not touch it without the appropriate paperwork which was still sitting in England due to our hasty departure.
A quick phone call to Moira in Bradford on Avon where we had the vehicle addressed to see if the paperwork was there and to pick her brains for any advice she may have regarding vehicle disposal.
The ever reliable Moira came shining through and was able to post us everything we needed, Thanks Moira you are a gem.
We spent a day with Maddy and Curl in Avignon while we were waiting for the documents to arrive, it was great to return to some sight seeing and allow Maddy and Curl to display local sights and indulge in some native cuisine.
Next day was back to reality and the motor wreckers to negotiate the disposal and towing, fortunately he was prepared to cop the towing charge and by Monday morning we had stripped whatever we could give away to a good home and waved goodbye to our home of the last 4 and a half months as she left for her new home.
A wonderful German family camped next to us became the new home for my trusty bike, I tried to give them the bike but they insisted on paying for it which was very generous as I do not think he really needed it, I tried to return the money but he was so insistent that all I could do was promise to treat the children with it, so Thank you Martin, Christina you are very kind.
Tuesday mornings task was to return the Toyota Yaris to SIXT a cheap hire car company in Europe, I would have hired another car from them but I need to drop a car at Calais and pick up another in Dover in the middle of June, but unfortunately they do not have offices in those locations. So Daniels fold up bike is put into the boot of the Yaris as it is 5 kilometers to the Europcar office from SIXT office. Has anyone seen the MR Bean movie where he is riding a bike through the French countryside in pursuit of a bus ticket stuck to the bottom of a chooks foot? Well this is how I felt as I rode this tiny bike with the oncoming traffic flashing lights, truck drivers blowing horns, workers in the fields that were tying the lats on the grape vines stopping work and staring and construction workers whistling and cheering as I pedaled past like some escaped loony fleeing the asylum.
So ends a huge chapter in our journey/adventure and the next chapter begins.
We now need to rearrange our plans slightly obviously so we have scoured the internet and found some reasonable accommodation, relatively cheap car hire and are able to research more options that suit our new mode of transport.
We have come across a self contained unit in the Dordogne valley just outside La Roque Gageac that we will be using for a week after we visit Perpignan.
We aim for Perpignan to deliver a quilt for a friend of Debbie to a family whose Daughter was an exchange student in Kyabram last year, after finding a bungalow we deliver the quilt and have 4 wonderful days touring roads the motorhome would not have survived even if it was brand new.
Driving around the Pyrenees is nothing short of spectacular.
We took a day trip into Spain to visit the towns of Cadeques and Rupit.








Rupit was like walking into a medieval fairy tale.
The moment we crossed the suspension bridge we
knew we were in for a treat as we marveled in the
architecture of the buildings clinging to the cliff faces
leaning, groaning and fighting against gravity to continue
their life where they were built.













On the way back to Perpignan we were treated to some amazing scenery
as we travelled along a mountain ridge Alp La Molina at 1800 meters above
sea level looking down at the clouds as they rained on the villages in the gorges
and valleys below.

We spent another day visiting the medieval town of Carcassone
which is one of the most Fascinating walled cities we have visited
with turrets and towers on every bend in the wall making it the
most interesting for the kids as it is the most castle like structure
we have seen so far. Decided to return via a different route
through the picturesque gorges towards the Route de Vignes
where the grape vines decorate the roadside in beautiful shades
of green and gold.


Cointha in between
the defensive
outer and inner walls
at Carcassone



I must say that we could have spent a lot longer
here and if not for the fact we have pre booked
accommodation we would have.
After checking out of Perpignon we are take the
long road to La Roqucombe Gageac to visit and
cross the Milau Viaduct the worlds highest bridge.
It is an amazing piece of engineering and we
watched a video on the construction at the visitors
centre explaining how they managed to put this
giant jigsaw puzzle together.







Milau Viaduct

The drive from Milau to La Roque Gageac was superb and and we could not have dreamed that we would see so many Chateaus in 1 day so look out for our next update and some great photos.