Wine Country
Arrival
I This was a little weird. Crossing the border from Spain to France is a little tricky, but I figured it out. First, I had to find my way onto a EuskTren train which is not something that pops up at all when you search for train rides to France. I had found this out on some forum talking about traveling between the two coutries. This train took me just accross the border into a little place called “Hendaye”. This was my first experience in France. To be honest, it was pretty nice! While waiting for the high-speed train, I went to a cafe and got a croissant and coffee for a little breakfast. I then boarded the train in Hendaye to arrive in Bordeaux a few hours later.
It was about a 25 minute walk from the train station to my hostel which was honestly not bad at all, and I got to see some cool sights along the way. I stayed at the Bloom Hostel which was super fancy with amazing facilities. The only problem was that there wasn’t much of a social vibe to the place. I ended up sending a message to the people on the Hostelworld app to see if anyone wanted to hang out. I ended up hanging with them for the rest of my time in Bordeaux.
Exploring
The city is amazing. Buzzing with people it’s a truly beautiful place (with beautiful people). I ended up going to an asian place for food the first night since that is what the group wanted, but the next day was the fun one.
Saint Emilion Wine Tour
I woke up the next day and got a delicious breakfast at the hostel which consisted of mostly bread and cheese (yum). I met up with one of the people I had met the day before and hopped on a bus to Saint Emilion for a wine tour. Our first stop was the town area where we got to see some beautiful old architecture as well as Europe’s largest monolithic church. I also managed to sit down for a glass of Saint Emilion wine and a cheese plate. Some of the best I’ve ever had. Next was a nice long tour through one of the wineries. This one was called “Chateau Bernateau” and was in the area that mostly grows red wines. I believe it was Merlot that they mostly grow. We got to look at the winemaking process and got to see the rows of barrels they have stored away to bottle when the time comes. After the tour through winery, we all got to try some and learned a little about the different tastes that are in these wines. The quality of these wines is incredible and I would suggest a wine tour like this to anyone going to Bordeaux. Anyways, that experience was amazing and here are some pics:
Foooood
The food here was absolutely amazing. It mostly consisted of dessert foods, but they were all incredible. I also got to try oysters for the first time! I got to try all the foods that I heard were popular in the area: crepes, macarons, and caneles.
These were all good in their own way, but I thought the macarons were the biggest burst of flavor and 100% the best.