Before we left Gagnac I had done some sleuthing about possible outings should the weather be awful; we get bored….whatever. Some years ago we had visited Biarritz but we hadn’t got as far as Bayonne although they are close to one another on the Atlantic coast. Today was to be the day.

I had tried to ascertain where suitable car parks were in relation to the old town as Mr McGregor can’t walk as far as he used to. I found three scattered across an area of parkland which I thought would be fairly easy to find. Wrong! Yes, there was a lot of green space but the roads across it were four lanes wide with several roundabouts with traffic lights. After going round and round, literally, I dived after a car that had suddenly veered into what looked like a no entry but had a sign for a car park. Result! The automated sign said three spaces left …and we got one of them.

At some point on the way to Bayonne I had suddenly remembered my phone was charging back in the chalet…disaster! No photos, or, more importantly, none of my screenshots etc. of places of interest. Relying on memory I realised we were just a short walk from Les Halles which I had thought would be a good place to start, especially as it was nearly lunchtime.

(Mr McGregor had a small camera with him so I was able to borrow that for recording the day …until I flattened the battery!)

After a wander amongst the stalls of beautifully presented goodies we stopped to taste and then buy a vacuum packed chunk of the celebrated Bayonne ham. Then the hunt for lunch. I’ve noticed that in big town centres the cafes tend to go in for poke bowls or odd salads, appealing to the young? We took a table at a place that had a few recognisable options. The day was a bit overcast but dry and warm.

We shared a planche of local charcuterie which was good but my following salad stopped short of being a Caesar by virtue of lacking everything you’d expect in a Caesar except for the crunchy chicken portions! But it was fine and sitting as we were on the edge of the huge concourse between the Halles and some beautiful colombage buildings we could people watch to our heart’s content.

After lunch we wandered over to gaze across the river Nive… at what we later found out was called Petit Bayonne, we were standing on the edge of Grand Bayonne.

I had a vague idea of which direction the cathedral lay so we climbed the pedestrianised streets towards it.

Leaving Mr McGregor recovering his breath outside I went into the cathedral but was frustrated by not finding anything that explained what I was looking at. There was a stall of craft bits and bobs that appeared to be sold in aid of a charity but even that was vague about its intentions.

There was some gorgeous painted decoration and then in a side chapel I found St Martin sharing his cloak with a beggar. St Martin has followed me since my teaching days when the nearest church was dedicated to him and I retold the story to each new class. When we bought our holiday home in Gagnac I remember visiting the church and turning towards the door saw St Martin depicted in the rose window above it.

Back with himself outside I suggested we needed to find the tourist office so as not to miss things or just to become better informed. We had to pick our way past noisy and dusty roadworks in front of the cathedral and head off in what we hoped was the right direction. Fortunately, between Google maps and street signs we eventually found the tourist office, itself marooned in the middle of road works right on the edge of town!

On the way there we had passed a museum and a fortified castle. Both of these places were explained to us by a very enthusiastic young man in the tourist office with the help of a town map. He told us to visit several places that we both knew we wouldn’t be able to manage that afternoon due to lack of time and our slow progression these days!

When he spoke about chocolate I told him we had visited a chocolate museum in Bairritz some years ago. Ah, he replied, but Bayonne is the true and original chocolate! Spanish and Portuguese Jews had brought the techniques of making chocolate to Bayonne in the 17th century when fleeing the Inquisition in those two countries. Looking again at the map of Bayonne on which he had circled several places not to be missed he clearly didn’t take account of our age or mobility but full marks for his presentation of Bayonne!

We did, however, retrace our steps to the cathedral, taking note of a huge war memorial on the way. This time I found my way round to the cloisters, a beautiful and quiet place. Barely recorded as this is where the camera battery died. Fortunately, not before I managed one shot of a fabulous exhibition of Basque clothing down the centuries set up around three sides of the cloisters.

Needing refreshment we took cold drinks on a shady terrace near a cake shop where I bought yet more cherry gateau Basques, sadly not a patch on the lady’s in Sare as we discovered later.

With ham already bought we passed on the various ham outlets our tourist chap had enthused about and didn’t have the energy to explore petit Bayonne and its chocolate on the other side of the river. Another time, we told ourselves. Now able to follow a physical map we strolled back down rue d’Espagne heading for our car parked just by the Porte d’Espagne, a huge gateway into the city. It was built as part of the city fortifications in the 18th century and for two hundred years it was the only way to exit the city towards the south. As recently as 1914 a bigger road was opened nearby to allow automobile access to the town.

The traffic leaving Bayonne was slow and heavy as we were in the middle of the Friday rush hour. It gave me time to ponder on the abundance of pampas grass that only seems to grow on the motorway embankments approaching the Spanish border. Interestingly, it has been illegal here since 2023 to have pampas grass growing in your garden, or to import it. It is considered an invasive species as well as a fire risk. But no more problems for us once we got onto the quieter roads winding towards la petit Rhune.