Serious cyclists in the Greater Daglan Area are on their bikes all winter long. And now that our weather has improved and given us an early spring, there are lots more cyclists on the road. But yesterday we saw a sight that gave us an especially warm feeling — cyclists having lunch on the terrace of Daglan’s Le Petit Paris restaurant.
My wife Jan and I were returning to the village sometime after 2 p.m. yesterday, having lunched at a restaurant in La Roque-Gageac (I’ll review that in tomorrow’s posting), when we caught sight of the cyclists — and stopped to photograph the scene.
There were two reasons the cyclists got our attention. First, and most simply, it meant that the weather is now so comfortably spring-like that even recreational cyclists are on the road, and able to eat out of doors. (These were obviously casual cyclists — no helmets or biking shorts in sight.) Perhaps more importantly, it gave us a nice flashback to some 15 and a half years ago.
It was in September 1998 when Jan and I took a bike trip to the Dordogne and Lot départements, with Canadian friends Keith and Kathy, and Bob and Barb. Our last lunch stop on that trip, before heading back to our home base in Gourdon, was the terrace of Le Petit Paris in Daglan. The restaurant had different owners at the time, but the lunch for the six of us was really enjoyable — and that’s when Jan and I were first smitten by our village.
So here was the scene yesterday:
Bikes surround the terrace at Le Petit Paris.
Amazing how our lives have changed over those 15 and a half years since our first trip here. And I have to say, we’re very happy about it all.
