We had an early flight to Paris this morning, so were on the hotel shuttle to the airport at 4:30. The shuttle runs 24/7, about every 25 minutes. I was glad we just had a five- minute wait.

The Dublin airport was wide awake even if we weren’t, and we got to our flight and on to Charles de Gaulle airport quickly (or maybe it seemed that way since we mostly slept for the 90-minutes).

Once through French immigration, customs and baggage claim, we figured out how to get the leased car from Citroen we will use to drive around France and beyond. We set off for Bordeaux, six hours from the airport, during a rainstorm.

We finally made it to our destination. After our hosts greeted us, I took a quick picture of our castle lodging before we set off for dinner. Long day and we are very hungry.

photos: dinner in Bordeaux

the castle where we are staying.

vineyards as we drove