Wednesday, 22 August

At 6:30 the morning looked promising. I could see spots of light on the grass outside the tent. Beau and I set off on what I call the ‘pee and poop trail’, which is the country road par course for our next daily event, the ‘beach run’. By the time we got to the beach and parked, the sky was dark and there was a wind, but Beau had a good time running in huge circles around the other dogs we’ve met on this stretch of beach…a spaniel, a little bug-eyed French bulldog, and today, we met a whippet, a cousin of the greyhound, and I chatted with her owner while Beau danced around her like Fred Astaire. Feeling warm and friendly now, in spite of the weather, we were headed back to the Kangoo when the boy in your fourth grade class who told on everyone passed by in his Coke-bottle-bottom glasses and raised a finger at me. “Vous n’avez pas le droit à promener un chien sur la plage” he said, telling me dogs weren’t allowed. I hadn’t seen the familiar sign of a dog head with an X over it, so I said something undiplomatic like “Ah shaddup”.
But sure enough, back at the car, I saw the sign.
“That does it, Beau, we’re going home”. He looked back at the beach kind of sadly, but he got in the car.
I broke camp, paid and told the girl at Reception that yes, I had indeed passed a nice séjour, even though there was a little too much noise at night. But it was amusing noise. Then I put pedal to metal and we were out of Brittany within the hour, looking for sun. Even just a bit of blue sky.
Eight hours in driving rain later, I was on a major highway near Bordeaux. Bordeaux sounds romantic, what with the wine and all, but it is an ugly city and the traffic is hell, especially at rush hour, and I was desperately trying to avoid it. I have a little compass to supplement my maps, and I headed east, but it kept reading south, or north—anything but east. After too long, I realized I was on the rocade, or beltway going around Bordeaux.
It was time to find a place for the night. It was still raining and now it was dark, so when I spotted a Kyriad, a kind of French Motel 6, I stopped and got us a 60-Euro room—with a bathtub. (French hotels gladly accept dogs—even the luxe ones).The only thing wrong with the room, besides the oppressive smell of stale cigarette smoke masked by an industrial air freshener, was that instead of a coffeemaker, it had a hot-water maker and teabags. Not for me, tea. I went back to the car in the rain and got the electric coffeemaker I’d bought for 8,90 in Brittany, and smuggled it in for my morning coffee.