Category Archives: Europe 2023

The weather was going to be glorious the next day so we decided to tick off another of the must do hikes in the area. I was a little tired and sore from the previous two day’s epic hikes but soldiered on and pretty much from the start the views made it all worth it.Continue reading “Luz Hike – Cirque du Troumouse”

A few of the hikes we had done so far had been recommended by the Lonely Planet guidebook and we have often found that if a hike is recommended in the book it is certainly worth doing. The Cirque d’Estaube was one of these hikes and so we once again packed up the van andContinue reading “Luz Hike – Cirque d’Estaubé”

Feeling full of energy and keen for one last big hike before we left the Pyrenees I was given the task of finding a hike which was not going to be too busy, not involve climbing over 800m and hopefully afford us some beautiful views. Easy. The hike I picked had us leaving from theContinue reading “Luz – Hike Barèges”

We were flicking through the Lonely Planet trying to decide where we would head to after the Pyrenees and we came across a little must not miss box which spoke about the Canal De Midi. A feat of French engineering in the 17th century which took 12000 people 15 years to build, a 241km canalContinue reading “Canal de midi”

We decided to take a meandering drive out of Toulouse north towards our next destination which had been hastily chosen the night before when we had decided to move on. The area we were driving through was Tarn and while I had heard of it before I knew little about it but apparently a driveContinue reading “Najac”

We had a one night stop in Castres to break the drive to Aignes where we had arranged to meet friends. We picked it pretty much because it was half way and Lonley Planet said it was worth a stop. The drive from Najac to Castres was filled with picturesque villages and the sun wasContinue reading “Castres”

We had some old friends from our time in Alpe d’Huez who we had kept in vague touch with and who had wanted to set themselves up in a small village in France. Well they had done it and the village in question was Aigne. It is pretty off the beaten track in the LanguedocContinue reading “Aigne”

We decided our next stop was to be the Cévennes National Park. Made famous by a Robert Lewis Stevenson book about a trek through the National Park with a donkey. You can walk the same paths he did by following the GR 70 walk. Neither of us have read the book (it’s on the list)Continue reading “Florac”

We had a wonderful 10 day stay with Mum, Dad, Kelly, Ben, Theo and Bea where we had a week of high 30s temperatures where just about all we could do was laze by the pool enjoying the view over the Mediterranean followed by a storm and a 10 degree drop in temp which madeContinue reading “Bourg Saint Maurice”

The second place we had earmarked to visit for potential places for future winter stays was Chamonix. I had never been but Tim had about 25 years ago so his memories were a bit rusty. Chamonix is situated in a valley with Mont Blanc towering above it. Everywhere you looked you have absolutely stunning viewsContinue reading “Chamonix”