Day 150: Part 2 … Continuing up the Garonne River to Bordeaux

Monday, 5 June 2017
Overnight @ Berth 127 in Bordeaux

Stats @ Ship’s Time 6:30p (CEST) … UTC 4:30p (5 June)
Temp: 73.8F (23.2C)
Position: 44.50.89N / 0.34.18W

To be, is to exist, but to travel, is to live.
~ Gustave Nadaud ~

I left off the previous post just before we left Le Verdon, France, where Insignia docked this morning for what was essentially a service call.  Let’s now continue the story of our day with the sail up the Garonne River …

Insignia’s lines were let go and we left our berth at 1:45p … 15 minutes later than the scheduled departure for Bordeaux, France.  I neglected to document it, but the change in the river level from this morning was obvious from the disappearance from view of the barnacles on the pier’s pylons.  Waiting on the water level to rise so we could navigate upriver was one of the reasons for docking in Le Verdon.

I continued to sit on the veranda and write, occasionally raising my head to check out the cargo vessels passing us as they headed downriver to the Atlantic.  The estuary is rather wide, so the scenery on either bank of the river was quite distant … thus our passage was quite relaxing as I had no urgent desire to bob up and down to take photos.  This continued for about two hours.

In the wide part of the Estuary, the only thing of interest is the puffy clouds.

When the riverbed started to narrow, vineyards began showing up on the starboard … the portside views were still distant.  Lush green vegetation … chateaux … estate homes … a town or two … distant church steeples — that best describes my view from the veranda. Passing what I think was Pauillac, we heard a man speaking on a P/A from shore.  I think he was MC’ing celebrations for what we learned later was Whit Monday … a national holiday in France.  Passing the countryside by ship, I wondered for a moment if we had made a mistake not taking a tour of the wineries in this region, which has been producing wine since the 8th century.  That thought vanished quickly, though.  We aren’t true wine aficionados … and mistake or not, we needed this day on the ship to recuperate from all the sightseeing of past days.

The closer we got to the city, the more fuel-storage places we saw.  Some looked like they might be small-scale refineries.  I wondered if they were filling stations for the cargo vessels plying the river, or if they were stations where fuel tankers took on or offloaded their freight.  There were other industrial facilities, but I’m not sure what purpose they served.  Where’s Peter when you need him?  Not for the first time since he left us in Civitavecchia, we bemoaned the departure of our destination speaker.  Past the refineries and fuel depots, we started seeing vineyards again.  They were mostly hidden by the trees lining the riverbank.  Behind them were signs of civilization.

Around 5:30p, a tugboat hooked up to Insignia’s stern.  Ten minutes later, CD Ray came on the P/A with an update on our arrival.  That usually means a delay … no exception this time … but just a small one.  The reason for the delay?  Strong currents … and we had to wait for the tide to subside so that Insignia could go under a second bridge.  Instead of 6:15p, the new expected arrival time was 6:30p.

La Cité du Vin is a museum where “wine comes to life through an immersive,
sensorial approach, all set within an evocative architectural design.”

Insignia docked right in the heart of Bordeaux … the advantage of being on a small-ish ship.  The riverfront promenade was filled with people sitting on the grass, strolling, biking, and otherwise enjoying a sunny Whit Monday afternoon.  There were no port facilities.  Insignia, which had turned around in a wide and deep section of the Garonne River after going under a bridge that was raised for our passage, was tugged bassackwards into berth 127 along the promenade.  No tall security fences in sight; just a row of crowd control barriers and a couple of security guards manning the small opening in the barrier to let the ship’s passengers in and out of the ‘secure’ area into which the Bordelais themselves were not allowed to enter.

Coming in bassackwards, we get a city view as Insignia approaches its berth.

No sooner was the ship cleared that the passengers who had disembarked for shore excursions in Le Verdon showed up to rejoin the ship.  We waited for the long queue to dissipate a bit before disembarking with the Gelmans and the Sweets to stroll along the riverfront.  We had no plans for any real sightseeing, but stopped along the way to photograph some of the landmarks — including the Place de la Bourse.  Alas, the ‘mirror pool’ was bone dry … no reflections of these neoclassical buildings, which housed the city’s stock exchange at one time.  Perhaps after dark the waters would flow … I hoped.  Wasn’t to be.  Unfortunately, that wasn’t our only disappointment.

Excursionists rejoining the ship in Bordeaux.

It’s nice to be docked in the city … easy on and off the ship.

Mui and Sonia had found a nice restaurant for dinner … not too far from where the ship was docked on the Garonne quayside.  With the GPS on the phone leading us, we made our way to the specified address.  When the GPS said we had arrived we stood scratching our heads … there was no restaurant … at least not one that was open.  The establishment was locked up tight.  “Ah,” we thought to ourselves, “we still have 15 minutes before the place opens for dinner.”  But we sort of knew we were kidding ourselves … with the chairs turned upside down over the tables, the restaurant was obviously not going to be opening anytime soon … even though Yelp and TripAdvisor both stated differently.  Turns out this restaurant — and many others like it — were closed for Whit Monday.

Long story short, we went for a meandering walk along the back streets and eventually came to Place du Parlement [Parlement Square] where we found several open restaurants.  They were all doing brisk business, so our decision on where to eat came down to which one could seat us.  I neglected to take a photo of the name of the restaurant — more a wine bar, really — so I am going to take a leap of faith and say that we ate at L’Autre Petit Bois [The Other Small Wood] … the menu I found online looks just like the one from which we placed our orders.  The selections consisted of salads, open-face sandwiches, and casseroles.  The food was good, but this was not the meal we were hoping to have in Bordeaux tonight.

Place de la Bourse

After dinner, we meandered a bit more before retracing our steps to return to the ship.  While our plans had not worked out as intended, we enjoyed the nighttime atmosphere of the city along the riverfront before re-embarking Insignia for a good night’s rest.

Tomorrow we go out to explore Bordeaux … in earnest this time.

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