Next day, more tourism. Letitia took us to the ruins of
Chateau de Larochebeaucourt, formerly a grand castle, but
sometime in WWII it caught fire, and apparently due to
misunderstanding the German occupation people who called
in the alarm, the dispatcher of the Angouleme fire brigade
sent the pompiers to the Chateau de Larochefoucauld, about
the same distance but in the opposite direction, so this
estate burned down. One can wander the ruins and imagine
what life was like a hundred, two hundred, five hundred
years ago. It was interesting in a spooky sort of way.

It seemed to make sense to visit Larochefoucauld as well,
which is extremely grand and well preserved. We actually
took a guided tour of the castle, led by a pert Asian guide
who was almost as well-spoken in English as she was in French
and no doubt would be in Khmer or Vietnamese. The place has
a wonderful and distinguished history, populated with famous
aristocrats many of whom were forward thinkers, most notably
the author of Maxims, who was one of the influential writers
of his time and the dedicatee of one of the Fables de La
Fontaine.

Afterward, we were parched and hungry and stumbled on a little
restaurant nearby, just across the river: La Creperie Chez
Francoise et Patrice, specializing in Breton-style buckwheat
crepes filled with savory things as well as sweet crepes
made out of flour.

Bonnie got a melon and Serrano ham crepe with a side of melon
sorbet; all the components were good, especially, I thought,
the crepe, but she found it dry. The combination of sweet-fruity
and salty-smoky is really inspired (though now commonplace).

Letitia and I both had the magret de canard in demiglace with
salad and carrot mousse. The duck was medium, the way I guess
most people like it, but a tad over for me, otherwise fine.
I traded some of my demiglaced crepe for some of Bonnie's
crisp but too dry version. The mousse was intriguing, with a
whisper of Indianlike spices; the salad was salad.

We split a rather nice homemade creme brulee for afters; it
was good but not substantially better than a commercial one.

Letitia had water, as she was driving; Bonnie got a couple
glasses of red wine; I had a cup of Norman hard cider, which
was semisparkling, semisweet, pretty good.

Letitia wanted to revisit the abbey church of Saint-Savin,
of which she had fond memories. Turns out in the decade or
two since she was there, it's been turned into a big tourist
attraction and wasn't so appealing, and anyhow it was in
the upper 90s. We walked around in the pretty interesting
Gothic church and then by the river a bit (marginally cooler).
The breeze being insufficient, we ducked into a bar opposite
the abbey for the usual refreshment. I ordered a Fischer
ambre, which in the middle of my pour ran out, so the barmaid
filled it up with some weird Belgian stuff that was not
unpleasant but not what I really wanted - a little too sweet
and too Constant Commenty. Whatever, it was quenching and
not grossly expensive.
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