And off to visit Pau

Firstly a lesson. Pau is not pronounced as in the 80’s band T’Pau of Carol Decker fame but as in another famous song; Ying Tong Tiddle I ….

I had two options for my means of travel to Pau, I could either walk along a grass verge of a dual carriageway for 5 miles or get a taxi. I opted fro a taxi. The driver recognised the Leicester Tigers logo on my shirt and we talked about rugby for the journey.

Pau is a city of many hills, or so it seemed to me, and very easy  to get lost in without a map. It is also a city with very strong English connections and this is shown in some of the architecture. I was told that an English princess and her courtisans lived in the city over 200 years ago during the revolution.

It was a very sunny and warm November day in Pau and a lot of people were sitting in the many city squares resting to the sound of the water fountains. You have to be careful in one paticular square as the water fountains seem to spout up at random from curiously positioned slabs within the square.

As I passed one side street just off a main square I saw a newsagents, in fact the first one I had seen that morning, next to that was an HSBC bank. On seeing these my first thought was that there must be an Irish pub nearby and yes there was. I passed it by as I had better things to do then have a discussion on the Ireland-France football game. Maybe next time.

I had lunch sitting on a terrace looking towards the pyrenees and two years ago I would have thought that it was reasonably price but with the current exchange rate it seemed very expensive.Then I was off to the rail station to check on trains to Lourdes in preparation for my next trip and then a taxi back to the hotel. Yet again the taxi driver recognised the logo and the conversation revolved mainly about rugby.