Bordeaux Train Station
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44°49’35.5008″N, 0°33’22.3488″W

to

Balcons de L’Ocean at Biscarrosse
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44°26’55.3128″N, 1°15’14.3460″W

This was our last day in Bordeaux. We took the bus from our hotel down to the main train station. Very convenient as we didn’t have to make any changes to get to the train station even though the bus ride was about 30 minutes.  The Avis car rental depot was located there and we were scheduled to pick up our car at 2:00 pm.

We had to check out of our hotel by 10:00 am so we had several hours before we could pick up our rental car.  We took advantage of the time & had a long lunch at a nice restaurant across the road from the train station.

Photo above- this restaurant has an amazing bar. It’s huge & must be 25-30 feet high. The inside of the restaurant was also very large & must be a very busy place in peak tourism season.

We had a 90 minute drive from Bordeaux to Biscarrosse. Most of the trip was on divided highways. We would have preferred to have taken secondary roads, but that would have involved a lot of driving through a major part of Bordeaux, and we just didn’t want to get into that.

Thankfully the train station is located just a few blocks from a divided highway passing through Bordeaux,  so getting out of the city was very easy. Hopefully it will be just as easy when we have to return the car to the same place a week from now.

This time Avis gave us an Opel brand 4 door car with a 6 speed manual transmission. The car feels a bit bigger & more peppy than the Fiat we had last year. We really liked the Fiat. Hopefully the Opel will be a good car for us too!

This car is bright red. We have decided to name it “Opiee”.  Catherine feels comfortable in this car because it already has a small dent in the right rear door (from a previous rental that Avis has noted), so we feel like that the car has already had an incident. Therefore we will have less to worry about.

Photo above – Catherine with Opiee the Opal – on the “dent free” side.

Our drive to Biscarrosse was fairly easy & we didn’t get lost – not even once! Our route took us past the giant sand dune that is a major tourist attraction in this area. We will travel to see it tomorrow, it is only a 15 minute drive from where we are staying.

We arrived in Biscarrosse around 3:30 pm. This is not your typical French village. It is more like Bondi Beach, with a surfers vibe to it. The houses & commercial buildings are fairly modern in design – a big change from what we’ve been used to seeing for the past few weeks.

Photo above – our hotel. We have a room on the 2nd floor, just above the surf shop & beside the casino!

Our hotel room is actually part of a condo/hotel. It appears that many of the units are owned by individuals who rent them out when they are not using them. Our unit is a compact one bedroom with a nice sized bathroom & a combination kitchen/living room. There is a balcony that faces the ocean but we can’t see it because of the giant dune in front of the property. It is the same for the entire village. No ocean views unless you walk up to the top of the dune. Then the view is fabulous!

Photo above  – the view of the Bay of Biscay from the top of the dune in Biscarrosse is stunning. Pure sand beaches as far as you can see in either direction.

There is a really nice sidewalk path along the top of the dune in the village. The authorities have done a pretty good job of protecting the dunes in an area that is very popular with tourists & surfers.

After walking around the village for a while we went back to our hotel then Catherine decided to try out the pool.

Photo above – the pool at our hotel. It’s not very big but Catherine said it was fun to have a few laps in.

After supper we walked back to the dune & down to the beach. Even with the sun setting there were still lots of people on the beach & also in the water catching the last few waves before dark.

Photo above  – the surf is not big today but people were still having a good time.

Photo above  – Catherine (center) contemplating the surfing life…..

Photo above – surfers catching the last waves before sunset.

Photo above  – Catherine got this shot just as we were getting ready to go back to the hotel. It caught the waves & the wet sand perfectly.

Photo above – Biscarrosse has something for everyone. This casino is beside our hotel. We were a bit worried about this location being noisy at night but it turned out there was no concern. I expect that my snoring was louder than anything going on outside after 10:30 pm – at least during this time of year.

Tomorrow we go to see the really big dune – the Dune du Pilat – the largest sand dune in Europe!

Cheers!