words by Williams

Sunday June 11

Macon is not on the Rhone, it’s on the Saone and it’s further north, beyond Lyon. We know we have to do the fast route for part of the journey, which means yet more tolls, but we’d also like to drift off into the countryside to take a look at a few places on the Route du Grand Crus as we head deep into wine country again. 

Actually, it’s all wine country isn’t it. Heaven knows what would happen to the French economy if phylloxera or something like it ever takes hold again.

After Maisie’s Avignon tunnel shenanigans we don’t realise it but there’s more fun waiting.

There are tunnels to come. And they’re bigger and longer. She’s not going to like it.

Around Lyon there are some very long tunnels indeed. Maisie says what she sees, or what the satellite’s telling her at least. When we’re in a tunnel, she’s actually seeing what’s going on above.

Which is why for about 10 minutes solid we’re getting this: “Go left, go right, make a U-turn, go straight for 10 minutes then turn left. At the roundabout take the second exit. Go right, go left, make a U-turn, at the roundabout take the third exit” and so on.

Maisie’s hysterical and Cal’s in hysterics. I’m just trying to steer us through a very long tunnel with one woman demanding I go this way and that and another crying with laughter.

Eventually all is calm again.

We get off the main road at Villefranche-sur-Soane expecting one of those Macon Villages you see on bottles.

As it transpires, Villefranche is a bit bigger than a village. It’s an industrial town with a population of around 40,000. We’ll have to keep going for the villages.

Cal likes the idea of Villié-Morgon, so that’s where we head. Beyond Belleville-en-Beaujolais were back in the middle of sunny vineyards again.

When we get to Villié, hoping for a spot of Sunday lunch, it looks like the whole village has turned out for a wedding. People are chatting in groups outside the church of Saint Vincent in the centre.

We slot Betsy into a grassed area next to the park and walk down the hill to take a look at what’s open. Not much as it happens.

We’ve seen a restaurant by the side of the road about 10 minutes back towards Belleville. When we passed it, there seemed to be no-one there, but now La Robe Rouge looks pretty busy. You walk up to it along a gravel path through lawns onto a sizeable terrace.

The two young serving staff look busy and efficient. Because we’ve not booked, we’re put on a table just inside the indoor section of the restaurant.

Dinner would be a tasting menu, lunch is a choice of two or three starters, mains and desserts.

We do get an amuse-bouche very smartly and Cal has a rosé while I’m on water as designated bussy.

Lunch is almost another Sorgue experience. The staff are great. I joke with the waitress that she seems to be getting her steps in today. “Every day,” she says and laughs “I am an athlete”.

Cal’s main is a hazelnut crusted loin of pork and mine is mackerel with roasted fennel. It all seems like very ‘grown up’ food and I’m not sure I can identify what exactly in my two purees My dessert is like a garden in miniature.

With starters and wine it a pretty pricey Sunday lunch, but fabulous all the same. We’ve been spoilt for food over the last few days, that’s for sure.

The campsite at Macon is a large municipal at the north end of town which looks like a commercial area has grown up around it. There’s a big supermarket 500 metres away and a Mickey D’s across the road. Ordinarily I might be quite tempted.

We find our pitch, settle in and roast for the afternoon before the evening brings an Aix-style thunderstorm.

It clears the air, but it’s bloody noisy. And wet.

Monday June 12

If anything, today is hotter than yesterday before the thunderstorm.

We’ve collected a tourist map of Macon from reception when we arrived and go in search of the riverside garden pictured on the reverse side.

We’re on a sweaty A-Line bus. It used to go from just outside the campsite, but now it goes from outside the supermarket. A helpful lady in a hijab tells us that the bus will come from the ‘wrong’ direction, wait at the stop across the road for a few minutes, then go round the roundabout and come back the other way.

It does.

It’s only 10 minutes or so into town, but the sudden arrival and two-stops-later departure of a group of noisy school children having a water fight at the back of the bus makes a sticky journey even less comfortable.

The bus stop is at Place de la Barre where an ornamental pond sits in a shaded park with a statue in tribute to the work of grape pickers at the top end.

Everything from Place de la Barre is downhill to the river. When we get to the river, trying to find shade in narrow streets, everything really does appear to have gone downhill. The riverside park is nowhere in view and it’s none too attractive.

Inevitably it’s lunchtime. Lunch is salad and good value at shaded tables at La Maison de Blois in La Place aux Herbes. Google Maps hasn’t caught up with the work yet so the view there makes it look a bit dated. Now the area looks like the middle of a building site. It’s going to be another great open space in a French city when its finished, but for now, not so much.

Re-reading the map, it seems just not made the right riverside connection. Our park is a couple of blocks down from where we arrived. We look again. Eh, as the French say, Voila! 

It looks like they’re getting ready for some kind of event down on the riverside. For now, though we’re still looking for shade.

An old man who’s sitting on a bench for two under trees in a small wooded area sees us and graciously moves onto a seat for one nearby. We thank him for his kindness.

Time to go, though. We walk slowly back up the hill to the park at the Place de la Barre. There’s a German Shepherd dog splashing about in the pool. He has a yellow tennis ball, floating in the water and he’s watching it intently, as though it’s going to float away. He tries to paddle it back towards him, but it’s not working. The ball, if anything, is indeed floating away. That’s one hot, focused, confused but entertaining dog. 

The bus terminates at Auchun, which gives us some time for a little shopping. Inevitably there are bottles. Carrying them back to Betsy in more cruel sunshine seems much further than 500 metres.