Day 11 – Brive railway station

It has to be one of the more difficult changes – from La Treyne to French rail. The cheese eating surrender monkeys had managed to frighten us with a rail strike and then they cancelled Ben’s flight with an airport strike. They then refused to recognize Kathy’s credit card. But in the end we made it to the station and everyone had tickets. We hope that all the travel goes as well as the trip did.

From Jim’s journal:
A final breakfast and everyone is packing for travel. The Rissels, Schmickers, Cronks, Nancy and Bob are off to Paris from Gare Brive. They will fly home in the morning except for Rick who is headed for Kuala Lumpur and a scouting event. John and Bobbie leave early to catch a plane in Paris for New York. Roethes leave with Ben, Anna and Esperanza for Toulouse to catch a train to London. Ben will fly to Paris and then on to Valencia. The girls are off to Marseille. Peter awaits the arrival of his son and will do some research for future trips before returning to Bristol.

ALL IN ALL, A VERY LOVELY AND REWARDING TRIP.

“Nearly a year ago at the Schulte’s house, we all heard Peter describe this trip. I remember thinking that Peter did a “less-than-dead-ass-perfect” job of selling this terrific experience. Fortunately, all of you saw through Peter’s “British Reserve” and decided to come anyway. What Peter needed then are a few “hard sell” points to put a little “sizzle with the steak” in order to appeal to an American crowd. So, Bobbie and I have put together a few selling points that Peter will be free to use (at no charge) with other groups in the future! In typical American fashion, we have organized these selling points as a top ten list. Bobbie, you are on.

TOP TEN REASONS TO TRAVEL WITH
DUENDE TO THE DORDOGNE

Bobbie starts off:

# 10 With Duende, you travel with intelligent, witty, charming, creative, athletic, photogenic people – and none of them are Stanford alumni!

# 9 With Duende, you have the pleasure of a “STEPPING STONES” tour with Christine to see Lascaux, the Prehistory Museum, and Grotte de Font de Gaume – a true “Duende Moment”!

# 8 With Duende, you begin to understand, even in a foreign language – the meaning of a tapestry, and a tapestry, and a tapestry, as painstakingly presented by a dancing Frenchman, OR, you get a wonderfully animated tour of an old working flour mill by Hubert who made sure to linger long enough to have his picture taken in various poses.

# 7 With Duende, each picnic is a beautiful presentation of colorful salads, cheeses, pates, tarts and wines of the region. Did I mention tarts? All of which leave you yearning for a Duende Cookbook!

# 6 With Duende, all walks are “generally downhill”. Some might be “one up and two downs”, or was it “two ups and one down”? Hmmmm!!

Back to John:

# 5 With Duende, there are two muy bonita ladies who shop, chop, prepare and present the most glorious picnics and they certainly know how to keep the wines flowing!

# 4 With Duende, your hikes are measured in inches, not miles or kilometers; and Eleanor of Aquitane comes along as your personal guide!

# 3 With Duende, you get Brilliant Ben who is quick with answers; always willing to help; and, I think you all will agree, Ben has become a true friend to each of us.

# 2 With Duende, you get Peter who is our resident linquist, historian, art and architecture expert, trail guide, etc., etc. Peter puts so much effort into making the trip a wonderful experience for each of us.

#1 And, finally, the number 1 reason for traveling with Duende is that you just know that every little detail, in fact the whole trip itself will be – all together now – “DEAD ASS PERFECT”!!