Bridgette and I took a road trip recently to see a few sites around the southwest of France. First on our list was the Dune du Pyla, or the "Great Dune of Pilat," to add the epithet and alternate spelling, which is about 60km from Bordeaux along the Atlantic coast. This beast is about 1.5 miles long and 350 feet tall, making it ideal for burning out quads grown in Illinois, and also ideal for concentrating winds for some sweet paragliding. Sorry, but we did no paragliding ourselves, just sat and observed the crazies around us doing so.
On the back side of the dune are several campgrounds, where we set up camp for a night. The site we were given was exactly at the base of the dune, so needless to say our gear and car are now encrusted with sand.
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| Bridgette's hiding in this pic... |
Now, back to those burnt quads. Climbing 350 feet of sand is hard. Luckily, near us was a staircase of a sort that helped ascend us, maybe, 250 feet. Still, I think a wonderfully engineered escalator could do wonders. Just kidding.
Reaching the top, though, provides an awesome vista of the ocean and horizon. We spent most of our day relaxing on that dune.
And in the end, we caught a pleasant sunset as the temperature dropped extremely. No amount of wine could help that.
After the dune, we continued our drive south along the Atlantic coast, headed for a town called Saint Jean de Luz...
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