St Jean and la Rhune

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Today we went to St Jean de Luz on the way to a vintage mountain railway. We were in the attractive French seaside town for a couple of hours taking in the sights of the Grande Plage (beach) and witnessed some the Pentecostal celebrations which were very Basque. Horses and Spanish style costumes were much in evidence and a statue of the Virgin Mary was paraded through the town. We had a coffee break in a nice hotel and a quick tapas break in the square before rejoining the coach to Col des Ingles for the train. A cycle race caused a 30 mins diversion.

The petite train de la Rhune is a cog train and takes a very steep ascent up La Rhune mountan to 900m in about 30mins. Quite spectacular but noisy and not very comfortable. It was still 27deg at the summit. We had an hour to take in the panoramic views of the bay of Biscay from Hendaye and Hondarribia towards Bayonne and have a cold drink. The cafes and bars at the summit gave welcome relief from the heat.

Dinner was in the hotel again and the wine was flowing freely as usual.

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