Our aim was to drive from Verteuil to Cognac, then Saintes, then Royan and onto Île d’Oléron to stay the night. The next morning we would drive to La Rochelle and then onto Île de Ré, another island off the coast, before driving west back to Verteuil.  All up, non-stop, this is just a six hour drive.

The town of Cognac is only 55 minutes or 80km south-west of Verteuil and also sits on the Charente River.  The town gives its name to one of the world's best-known types of brandy or eau de vie. Cognac must be made in designated areas around the town of Cognac and must be made according to strictly defined regulations to be granted the name Cognac.  There are a number of Cognac houses that all have visitor centres.  Cognac is a lovely town with pedestrianised streets in the centre, quaint and clean, with groupings of ancient half-timbered houses.  We walked around the centre, had a coffee on the edge of the Place François I, and wandered along the river past the St Jacques gate constructed in the 13th century, the only remaining opening to the previous ramparts.

Less than 30 minutes away and also on the Charente River is the town of Saintes.  Now in the Charente Maritime department, Saintes has a long history.  Of most interest to us is the first century Roman amplitheatre and the dedicated auberge to pilgrims of the chemin de St Jacques (camino).  After a lunch of galettes and crepes we were on our way again to Royan.

One hour north west and we crossed the almost 3km long bridge to the Île d’Oléron, where we will stay the night. Very popular with French holiday makers, it is a long, narrow island, and has one main road up the spine of the island which I imagine is a bit of a headache during the busy summer holiday period.  The island is very flat (there is a lot of cycling going on here) and has a thriving oyster industry.  This was our first visit here.  There are about three little villages on the island - we stayed at Saint-Pierre-d’Oleron which is a vibrant village with lots of restaurants and cafes.  It’s a relaxed, low-rise, sea-side strip, reminiscent of 1980s Bribie Island or Caloundra (another Australian reference).

​The next morning we are off to La Rochelle, a city on the Atlantic coast with a long history.  There is significant Roman history, links with the Knights Templar, a significant role in the Hundred Years’ War and the French Wars of Religion, the Huguenot rebellions and with Nouvelle France in North America.  It was a German stronghold in WWII, hosted a submarine naval base, and was the last French city to be liberated at the end of the war.  I recommend watching the 2018 TV series Das Boot on the streaming platforms – La Rochelle was a prime location. 

You can spend an interesting couple of hours wandering around the centre, with its white stone buildings and colonnades, and along the old harbour front.  Hundreds of restaurants and cafes to choose from, specialising in seafood, oysters, moules frites and Charente pineau.  Take a hat, sunnies and sunscreen – the sun beating off the white stone can be vicious. 

Our original intention was to use La Rochelle as a jump off platform to Île de Ré, another Atlantic holiday island accessible by a long road bridge just to the north of the city.  But the day was getting on and we have already visited Île de Ré a number of times, so we pointed the car east and wound our way along slower, secondary roads back to Verteuil.

We notice that as soon as you cross the border from Charente to the Dordogne the gently undulating land and fields of grain, hay, rape seed, corn and sunflowers is left behind, and transitions to a much more hilly landscape covered by more forest. 
​We have left the wind turbines behind, and notice that the villages and towns seem more plucked and coiffed.  The stone houses and buildings have changed from the grey-white Angoulemois stone to the yellow-ocre coloured stone of the Dordogne river cliffs.

​Our first stop, as usual, is Brantôme.  Brantôme, a beautiful riverside village on the Dronne river in the north of the department of the Dordogne.  It is always on our list of places to visit and we have been many times - it never fails to impress.  The town has a beautiful mixture of medieval and renaissance architecture to admire.  The Benedictine abbey on the banks of the river is superb and the old stone bridge and the beautiful mill have been transformed into a hotel and restaurant.  The abbey was originally built by Charlemagne in 769 and there is a troglodytic section behind the abbey built into the cliffs.  

​After a walk around the Friday morning markets, a coffee by the river and a quick look at the various galleries in the old converted abbey, we left Brantôme for Lascaux.  Lascaux IV which is a fabulous reproduction of the nearby 20,000 year old cave art that was stumbled upon by a group of boys and their dog in 1940. We visited Lascaux II in 2014. Lascaux IV is entered through an amazing concrete structure – the French do Visitor Centres very well.  This is truly worth a visit, especially for fans of “The Clan of the cave Bear” series!  The large life size depictions of bison, cows and horses on the walls and roof of these caves are inspiring.

Sarlat-la-Canéda is a must-visit town.  ​The market town of Sarlat is reknown for its foie gras - you'll see images of ducks and geese everywhere!  It's a special,  lovely old town, and the spring-board for this "special" region of France.  It has been relatively untouched in recent centuries and as a result, Sarlat has remained preserved and one of the towns most representative of 14th century France.  Try to arrange your visit to include Saturday, as it has a fantastic, busy market on Saturdays mornings.  I am going to shamelessly recommend the little B&B that we stayed in – Noreli B&B – on the old town square, just 4 rooms, huge spaces, above a restaurant, friendly staff, and very reasonably priced.

​Sarlat is a great base to see the rest of the Dordogne River valley.  Across a couple of days we visited some lovely chateaux and some other places which are worth highlighting.

​The Dordogne is scattered with ancient châteaux.  There is not a place along the Dordogne River valley that you cannot see at least a couple of châteaux, many built on the cliffs of the river or on some other prominent high area, during the Middle Ages.  While the towers and turrets of châteaux in Charente tend to be topped by conical slate tile roofs, those in the Dordogne are typically topped by pyramidal lauze stone roofs.

The Château de Beynac is one of the best-preserved and best known in the region.  At the time of the Hundred Years’ War, the fortress at Beynac was in French hands. The Dordogne was the border between France and England.  Not far away, on the opposite bank of the river, the Château de Castelnaud  was held by the English.  The Dordogne region was the theatre of numerous struggles for influence, rivalries and occasionally battles between the English and French supporters.  ​

​in the Resistance during WWII.
The story of the adjacent chapel in the grounds is also interesting as it describes the efforts of the current owners of the château in the process of restoring it, and how they worked with archaeologists, universities and the community to understand its history.

​Domme is a little town that is well worth a visit and offers beautiful views up and down the Dordogne valley and river.  It lies high on a rocky outcrop overlooking the Dordogne river and is a bastide, or fortified medieval town.  Today, Domme is a member of the association Les Plus Beaux Villages de France ("The Most Beautiful Villages of France").  
Domme was founded in 1281 and has a turbulent history.  In 1307, the Knight Templars were imprisoned in Domme during the trial against them.  During the Hundred Years' War, the bastide was coveted by the English who first took the town in 1347 and repeatedly changed rulers throughout the war until 1437 when it finally fell under French rule again.  The Wars of Religion brought new turmoil. Protestants took the town in 1588 by climbing the cliffs at night to open the gates.  Apparently this was a short success, as the Protestants handed the bastide back to the Catholics in 1592. 
Domme is a great town to wander around, take in the views and do some shopping in the artisan shops.

Fun fact:  On the subject of road trips, I read an article recently that it is often claimed that there are as many roundabouts in France as in the rest of the world!  Approximately five roundabouts are constructed every day in France [The Local France: Inside France, 6 June 2026].

​Venture 20-30 minutes further afield and there is evidence of places and structures created in neolithic times.  Dolmens and tumulus are sprinkled across the Charentaise countryside where people lived, held rituals and were buried.

Roman civilization had a huge impact on the local area as the Roman empire spread into and across Gaul.  Roman settlements can be found in the local Charente area as they travelled along the roman roads from Rome to Lyon and across to Saintes, just a little to the west of here. ​

Scattered across the landscape are numerous 10th, 11th and 12th century churches.  These are typically beautiful, simple stone structures, stripped of any finery during the French revolution.  Steeped in history, they offer calm, cool, contemplative environments.  A few may even have the remnants of beautiful and colourful wall frescos, perhaps with the plaster slowly falling away, and mould reaching up from the damp stone floors.

​See other blogs from Verteuil at http://www.houseinverteuil.com/house-in-verteuil-blog

Every French village, town and hamlet has a road-side sign that announces its name as you drive into it (and then again, as you leave it - the exception being that there is a red diagonal line through the name of the location). 
Over the last month or so we have been noticing many, many of these village signs have been turned upside down.  A freak of nature? A nation-wide prank?  Vandalism?  Dysphasic sign writers?
Everywhere we have been recently, we are seeing these upside down signs!  Whether it be in our local Charente area, or in Deux-Sevres, Vienne, the Dordogne, or even down south where we were recently in Aude, Hérault of Gard. 

Well, after some investigation, it seems that this phenomena is really a quirky protest of young french farmers!

According to John Lichfield of The Local (7 December 2023, news@thelocal.fr), this is part of an agricultural "rebellion of the signs" which started in the Gard in the south of France and is now spreading across the country.  It is a campaign design by the French young farmers association, Jeunes Agriculteurs, around a long menu list of grievances.

These consist of:
1. Farmers paying increased licence fees of 47 million euros in 2024 for pumping water from the ground and for pumping pesticides etc into it (the government has now cut this requirement);
2. A proposed EU treaty with South America that would bring cheap Brazilian and Argentinian beef into France;
3. The rising price of agricultural diesel fuel and delays in the payment of EU subsidies
4. No clear national strategy for balancing the needs of farming with an ecologically friendly future.

And so, this peaceful, attention-grabbing campaign has commenced to promote the grievances of young farmers - "Nous marchons sur la tête." (We are walking on our heads).

-Everything was totally under control with the preparations for closing up house smoothly completed. Hire car washed, house cleaned, linens changed, fridge emptied, heating system repaired, rubbished and recyclables bagged and placed in the street, suitcases carefully packed, fav airport hotel booked due to the early departure the next morning. Even time for a final stroll around the streets of old Angoulême and a café crême and croissant before dropping off the hire car and crossing the road to the station. We were both a little smugly self-satisfied that there was no last minute dash - as has occurred on occasions in the past.

The TGV was on time and we ensconced ourselves on board. First station - Poitiers. About one and a half hours after boarding at Angoulême, the city of Tours marked the half way mark to Paris. Less than 5 minutes before stopping at Tours, for some reason I sensed something was wrong, plus the need to check for my passport. Immediately I realised that my passport was still safely in the house in Verteuil…… oops.  Don said I suddenly turned very pale, which is probably fairly accurate as I couldn’t believe how I could have neglected to think about ensuring I had my key to travelling home .... I had no idea how this was going to turn out.

The train stopped and I jumped off the train with my suitcase, but without a firm plan on how I was going to get back to Angoulême, and then Verteuil, and then back to the CDG airport in Paris by early the next morning. It was three pm and already it was flashing across my mind that there weren’t many options.

Wrestling with my heavy suitcase out of the Tours station, I looked for an Avis car rental office across the road, with a view to potentially driving back to Verteuil and then retracing my steps and then onto Paris and the airport. I entered, and was firmly told “no cars monsieur, impossible”.

Next option, quickly back to the station to check out the train schedule back to Angoulême and it was fortunate that one was arriving in about 15 minutes. Grabbed a ticket and by 3.20, not believing my luck that a TGV was heading in the right direction, was on a train back to Angoulême, a couple of hundred kilometres away but still with no concrete plan about what to do when I got back there.

Using the wifi I managed to find out that the only train back to Paris that day was at 5.36pm and I still had to work out how to get the passport in Verteuil, which is about 35 km from Angoulême.

We have friends in a neighbouring village to us and I was able to contact Maria on messenger - she agreed to drop everything, and along with Björn, drive to Verteuil to collect my passport and then drive down to Angoulême to deliver my passport to me. What a relief to have such good friends who were willing to help me get out of a pretty awful predicament!

So I arrived back in Angoulême, Maria and Björn did the passport drop, and I procured a ticket and seat on the day’s last TGV to Paris - all in about a thirty minute turnaround.
So fortunate that the train schedules were working in my favour today, and so grateful for amazing friends such as Maria and Björn.
​
Don has firmly said that from now on, he will be taking on passport duty. At least he’ll have the pleasure of my company on the flight tomorrow morning!

Angouleme is also well known for its collection of colourful wall frescos, or murales, painted onto building walls across the city and some of its inner suburban areas.
In July, we followed a self-guided walk that explores these murales.  You can follow the "hard-copy map from the Tourism Office, or download the app "Murs bd Angoulême".

One of our favourite past times in Angoulême is to wander the old town and its seemingly haphazard, rickety old paved streets.  We always seem to get lost.  There are plenty of lovely shops and restaurants - including our favourite creperie.  Walking along the old ramparts around the old town also allows for lovely views out over the Charentais department.

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