DAY 7: LA ROCHELLE - REST DAY
FRIDAY 5 JUNE

It was nice to wake up knowing we didn't have to rush to get going. Although I wasn't feeling tired and in need of a physical rest I was looking forward to staying in one place for a day. Our first priority was to walk up to check that the tandem was still there. Luckily it was - I don't know what we would've done if it wasn't! We could now relax and go and find ourselves some breakfast.

Cafe de la Paix was an amazing building




We enjoyed wandering around the town

Rob's hand was still swollen from his insect bite and we decided to take the opportunity of going back to a pharmacy to see if he needed a doctor. After a bit of discussion they decided that, yes, it might be best if a doctor looked at it. They telephoned a local doctor for us as we explained we had no idea how the system worked in France and the doctor agreed to see us straightaway. We followed their directions to his office a couple of minutes walk away, rang the bell and walked in. This was a new experience for us. We had no idea if we were waiting in the right place - it just looked like the ground floor of a block of flats but after a while a door opened and the doctor said goodbye to his previous patient and called us in. He looked at Rob's hand and gave him a general check and diagnosed a spider bite. He wrote a prescription for some pills which we duly took back to the original pharmacy. We were very impressed that the whole process had taken less than an hour. However, it was approaching midday by this time and it was time to think about lunch.

The harbour didn't feel at all spoilt even though it was full of restaurants

We chose somewhere serving light lunches - with a view

After lunch we walked around the harbour and then it started to rain. As the hotel was so near we popped back and had a little afternoon snooze (it was a rest day after all). The rain didn't last long and once it had cleared up the sun came out and we walked back to the harbour and had the most amazing ice cream (chocolate brownie and cinnamon biscuit) and then went to find somewhere we could settle for an hour or two to read and catch up on our diary writing.

We found the perfect spot

It was so relaxing just sitting in the sun and I really enjoyed the day. It was everything a rest day should be. Soon it was time to start wandering round to look at menus to try to decide where we would eat. A slight breeze had got up and it was a little bit cooler than we would've liked so we needed to find somewhere sheltered.

We opted for a pizza restaurant on the other side of the harbour




It was a nice walk back to the hotel

Although by this time it was a bit chilly we (well I) couldn't resist the ice cream parlour again and I had a similar ice cream to the one I had had earlier as we sat on the harbour wall. It was just such a beautiful place. At 11pm we decided we ought to be sensible and get to bed as tomorrow we were back on the bike.