Day 16 -- Onward to Beaune

It was bath day for the Isla girl but since our hotel did not have a bath, I sat her on the shower floor and made do with the removeable shower head. I stood in there with her only to spy a thin yellow stream running toward my feet, originating awefully close to her little bum bum. Isla!!

We hit the street at 8:45AM, confident that we would surely find breakfast with ease. Not so. The patisserie (bread shop) was closed, the cafes were serving only coffee. It was about this point that I hit my limit after a couple of tiring, frustrating days in a row. WHAT ON EARTH do the French do for breakfast around here!!!?? I really, really just wanted to feel full. I wanted more balance than just bread and coffee. It was rainy and was forecasted to stay that way for the remainder of our trip. Wah wah wah. I might have been a bit cranky. :)

Finally we decided to cheat and purchased pain chocolate (chocolate croissant), fruit and yogurt at the grocery store and did what was probably a major no no by eating it at one of the outside tables at a nearby cafe. We ordered our coffee from the cafe and so justified our breakfasting there.

We were on the road at 10:30 and, by this time, it was pouring down rain. Once again, no sign of the mountain so no morning gondola trip for Graham! We decided that we'd obey the French rules of eating and be sure to stop for lunch between 12 and 2 so as not to repeat our previous days' string of luck.

We were driving through Macon about that time so pulled off the autoroute. We happened upon a nice strip of riverfront restaurants and opted for the one with "Lard" in it's name and a picture of a pig. Why not? It turned out to be a great choice and was the best meal for the price so far. We ordered the menu du jour, even though we didn't recognize any of the foods listed. Our first course was a small strip of what I'm pretty sure was raw salmon over delicious couscous with a small salad of greens, tomato and haricot verts. Yum! The salmon was mildly lemony and wasn't nearly as scary as it looked. Our second course was steak in some amazing onion sauce, ratatouille and a baked white potato with some sort of herbed cream sauce. The beef was so flavorful and the waiter said it was a very typical dish of the area (I think it was called Hampe du Eschilate?) We drank Beaujolais which was served chilled-quite tasty. We got to choose our dessert so I picked the one with the words "chocolat" and "glace" (which I have quickly learned means ice cream) and hoped I would receive a chocolate cake a la mode. Graham picked the "Souffle Grand Mariner" that also mentioned something about glace. Isn't his so pretty?

I won! Not only was mine a chocolate cake, it was a molten chocolate cake!!!!! Graham kept asking for bites of mine and kept saying "Dang it!" everytime he tasted it, out of jealousy of course. I definitely picked the best one.

We arrived in Beaune about 4:00 and the rain was still coming down hard. We had made reservations at a three bedroom B&B in a tiny outlying village called Orches. I had a feeling my Google directions to our place were going to be less than helpful. The first part was okay but the very end was...err...vague. This is word for word what they said:

"Turn right about 2 minutes.
Turn left.
Take the first right about 1 minute.
Turn left.
Take the first right."

Ummm so I guess they don't believe in street names in these parts? Graham thought I was kidding as I read them aloud. It wasn't long before I trashed them and changed my approach as the navigator to a method I call "wild guessing." We took a rather roundabout way but we managed to find Isabelle Raby's place thanks to some helpful road signs directing foreigners like us to various places of lodging. No one came out to greet us when we arrived but Isabelle came out after we knocked to show us to our room. The B&B portion of the old farmhouse was on the backside, overlooking the pool and perfectly manicured gardens. As it turns out, the house is older than the United States, built in 1774!!! Our (remodeled) room was formerly the chicken coop!

We backtracked to Beaune, admiring the absolutely gorgeous countryside, rock cliffs, vineyards and white cows (used to make the local specialty, beef bourguignon), imagining what it might look like if it were sunny.

For dinner, we settled upon a restaurant near the Hotel Dieu (old hospital). Today proved to be quite the day of eating as menus were ordered at BOTH lunch and dinner. The local specialties of Burgundy are escargot, coq a vin and beef bouguignon, all of which I was determined to sample before leaving this region. Graham ordered the menu which began with a sweet rose apertif, then escargot in hot garlic butter, followed by coq a vin, a cheese plate of three unpronounceable cheeses and lastly, dessert: a chocolately mouse cake (sort of the texture of jello), a sliver of coconut pie/tart and a chocolate pie. Graham was nervous about the escargot and made me do the honors and down the first snail. I was feeling fine about the whole thing until Graham started talking about how the snail's mode of transportation is via slime. I don't want to think about that right now dear. I popped the little creature in my mouth. Whoa, that's good! It probably helped that he was bathing in a pool of hot, garlicky butter. He was a bit chewy but, as long as I kept telling myself "think clam, think clam," it was really quite tasty. The whole ordeal reminded me of a seafood linguine with butter sauce. We'd wondered what the restaurant would think if 10 of the 12 escargot served returned to the kitchen when we were through but we needn't have worried. We sent the plate back empty.

I ordered beef bourguignon which was served with fried pommes de tierre (potatoes) and haricot verts. It tasted surprisingly similar to Graham's coq a vin and I decided I liked the beef dish I'd had at lunch much better. We ordered a local burgandian white wine (mostly chard) and local Pinot which we both shared. Our meal lasted about 3 hours which is not at all unusual. Given that it was 10 PM by the time we arrived back at the car, Miss Isla fell asleep on the drive home and slept in her clothes all night.