Bordeaux; Sunday, 20 July, 2014

Breakfast consumed I headed out into town and the first stop was the bell tower of the cathedral. A quick ascent up to take in the stunning views that rapidly started to disappear into clouds.

Back down on the ground I wandered over to a nearby café for a quick pit stop, and to sit out what I thought would be a short shower. Over an hour later after three torrential downpours it finally looked like it was starting to ease off on the rain, so I caught the tram round to St Michaels to climb its tower

Again, part way up the tower many of the views disappeared, but on this occasion it started chucking it down whilst I was up the tower, including a couple of flashes of lightning – not something to fill you with confidence given I’d just read the original tower had been destroyed by a lightning strike a couple of hundred years earlier.

Back down at ground level, and in the dry, I had a wander through the city, stopping off at the Grosse Cloche (big clock) and then down to Porte Cailhau.

I wandered a bit further down the riverside towards the Place de la Bourse and had a brief look round there before the next cloudburst sent me (and many other tourists) scurrying for shelter.

By the time it had stopped absolutely chucking it down it was gone five so I headed back to the hotel to freshen up and then a little later headed out for dinner at a nice restaurant I’d spied whilst sheltering from the showers.

The restaurant had quite a large outside eating area looking onto a very pleasant square, so I was a little miffed when I was directed to a table at the back of the terrace area, right next to the restaurant building. 20 minutes later I was very glad the waiters had done that as the skies opened for a torrential downpour that overwhelmed the umbrellas that were protecting the forward most tables and soaking a fair number of tourists.

Dinner consumed I had a bit more of a wander, playing hide and seek with the showers as they passed through, before heading back to the hotel to start the packing process and a good night’s sleep.