The Garonne and the Dordogne

Wednesday, Judy’s birthday, we venture into Bourq, a small but attractive hilltop town along the Dordogne. The townsfolk are still all sleeping but nothing stops us from appreciating an empty town.

The church has been opened for our visit and the ship’s tour manager explains that the last set of tourists on his ship donated over €200 to the church and the mayor of Bourq was so happy that he regularly personally sees to it that the church is opened whenever a tourist ship docks in his town.

From the top of the walled city we look down on the Dordogne flowing by and spy a sunken ship near land. The guide explains that is a remnant from WWII and it is a German boat sunk when the German army was trying to block the river and blow up the town in mid-1944, before they retreated, in the face of the American Armies invading France.

 This is the public laundry in the center of the town, a large concrete container of "fresh"? water - come one, come all and get your clothes clean, under the gaze of your other townsfolk.




This is an attractive villa that was seconded, during the War, by a bunch of German officers, overlooking the river from on high.




In the afternoon we dock at Blaye and tour the massive seventeenth century citadel built along the banks of the river. This citadel was constructed between 1685 and 1689, forming a part of a military complex along the river with Fort Pate and Fort Medoc. It seems that the English and the French have been at war ever since there have been 2 countries and ownership of this part of France has passed hands for hundreds of years. The warring of the 2 nations only ceased during the advent of the First World War, just over a hundred years ago.