The two of them wanted breakfast. I grumped about and said
I wasn't going to pay $12 (that's per each) for a bunch of
stale rolls and rancid coffee. Shortly I got the report -
I'd been wrong, there was no coffee at all.
At checkout I mentioned the issue of the spilled wine and
the broken glass, but the desk guy (the same one) shrugged
and said "these things happen," so I forgave the place its
heist of the $24 (or was that Euro, I forget).
Southward bound, we discovered a few more eccentricities
about the Garmin ... but also discovered that the onboard
GPS had been activated even though we hadn't paid for it,
and it was (despite a few quirks of its own) pretty
satisfactory, with somewhat more up to date maps.
We passed up Fontainebleau, despite its being only a
couple miles out of our way - the fact that there were
numerous confusingly mostly noncombinable tours available
at extortionate prices didn't help the cause.
And so we wended, part of the way impeded by a convoy of military
parts that took up the whole road and traveled at about 20 miles
an hour - I actually was surprised they hadn't closed the road
altogether for it.
Somehow we found ourselves going through the town of Orcay (c
with a cedilla), where I spied a likely-looking lunch stop.
By the time we found a place to turn around, we were at another
likely-looking lunch stop, so, having no evidence in one direction
or the other, we went in to Le Refuge, which looked jollily busy
and offered a menu du jour of entree, plat, fromage, and dessert
for E12. The main room was full, so we were seated in a side
room, which filled up pretty quickly too.
For starters, Swisher and lili got the special of the day - tomato
and cheese quiche with mustard, which they enjoyed; I tried a scrap
of the filling, which reminded me of Welsh rabbit with a bit of red
stuff (there's a name for this treatment, but I forget).
My terrine du chef had no defects and no particularly cheffiness
about it either - perfectly satisfying with the crusty bread.
The main course special, stewed pork cheek with Calvados sauce was
extraordinarily good in a simple stewish way, the pork porky but
not obtrusively gamily so, its sauce tasting more of a decent
white wine than it did of apple. The two guys had this.
lili got a sirloin steak, rare as ordered, really big, almost a
pound, quite delicious owing in part to its considerable fattiness.
Potatoes in France seem tastier than they do in the States.
Being on the edge of satiation, we passed on cheese, probably a
mistake.
Desserts were an intense blackcurrant sorbet with some whole
fruit frozen in and an equally intense flourless chocolate cake.
Saumur-Champigny Les Tuffes, Domaine de Sanzay 13 was pleasantly
pepper-spicy though a tad on the thin side.
We were pleased and in fact rather impressed; this turned out to
be the best bang-for-the-buck restaurant meal we had during the
whole trip. Looking things up on the Internet it appears we might
have done equally well at the other place. Next time.
Another three hours and after a couple minor detours caused by
the onboard GPS not telling you to turn until you were right
at the intersection, we pulled up at La Souvigne in Forges
(e accent grave), between Tulle and Argentat, where Ian and
Jacquie were just getting our welcome repast ready; we made
our acquaintance with the new residents of the house, yearling
kittens Basil and Rosemary, who won our hearts immediately.
I&J's La Souvigne used to be a well regarded B&B, but they
have decided to start the process of retiring, so for the
next few years they're running it as a gite, which means no
breakfast and somewhat less involvement with the guests, in
theory at least. It has been pointed out that as I've known
them for two decades, and Swisher has been BBS buddies with
him for almost that long, this was not exactly a standard
client-supplier situation.