#CountryKids Château de Suscinio, Butte de Cesar, Port Blanc

On a roll with these catch up holiday posts! Day 4 of our French adventures and we jumped in the car to explore further south... First stop was the Château de Suscinio which has been tasteful restored by the French government after being allowed to fall into disrepair:

It now looks like something out of a fairy tale with an impressive main entrance:

It was a real shame my children didn't know enough French to appreciate the hard work the curators have done to make it interesting for them. They did appreciate the fact that they could dress up:

And have a go at some interesting medieval games (the English instructions weren't as comprehensive as the French ones!):

It has all you could want from a medieval castle including walkways from which the garrison could drop things onto besiegers from:

There was a special hands on archaeology exhibition built for children but unfortunately all in French so my two only got a little out of it. It looks like the French are really keen on engaging young people into history which is fabulous.

By the time we came out it was very wet and we had a bit of an adventure finding somewhere to eat in the middle of nowhere. Just in time we followed signs and found an auberge:

This was a proper little French restaurant in the middle of the country side and we all got our first experience of galettes:

For the grown ups there was house cider:

And desserts were yummy crepes:

There was a scary moment when in the midst of a thunder storm all the lights went out... one waiter was quick of the mark and started to sing Joyeux Anniversaire which had everyone giggling! Luckily when we had finished eating the sun had come out and we went off to find the Butte de Cesar:

It was very easy to find our way to and up the Neolithic burial mound upon which Julius Caesar allegedly stood to watch his fleet in the bay. We let the children choose a less well used path down and they were keen to be adventurous: 

As you can see the bracken was very high and the path wasn't always easy to follow:

In fact at times we were almost fighting our way through:

The children were very amused that Gramps picked up a hitchhiking slug on his way down! When we reached the bottom we saw a sign that intrigued us so we went to find out what Pen Castel was:

Either the sign was wrong or we missed something as it was a lot further than 1.6 km when we reached the sea shore:

We were able to walk along the beach as the tide was out:

When we got to Pen Castel we discovered that it was a former tidal mill that still has some of the workings left in it:

Next to it were the funkiest public loos I have ever used which had auto flush and clean! Some how my daughter and I managed to confuse it though so hope it wasn't broken when we left...

We then walked back to the car and we still had time to head further along the peninsula in search of a bathing beach. Eventually we reached Port Blanc just after the car park became free: 

This was a proper beach but with high winds the surf made swimming by novices impossible. There was still plenty of fun to be had digging in the sand:

Having all this space with hardly anyone else there:

Proper lifeguards to keep everyone safe:

And for the brave you could go in the sea:

And enjoy the waves:

Of course a willing victim had to be buried in the sand:

And then there was time for one last jump in the waves:

before we had to head back to Carnac. There was time before bed to play cribbage:

And write those all important postcards home:

More adventures to follow...