Lacanau & Arcachon, France

Another thing that I love about Bordeaux is how close it is to the beach! We made a few day trips to the nearby coast during our stay in Bordeaux.

First we checked out Lacanau which was only about an hour away. We went straight to the beach, but I’ve heard great things about the lakes and nature reserves in the area so I guess we’ll have to save those for next time! Lacanau’s beach area has a large pedestrian strip lined with tacky shops, restaurants, and ice cream kiosks that lead you right to the water. The beach itself has nice soft sand but the water seems to have a very strong and powerful current. We constantly had to move our stuff back as the tide rose and rose. At one point, we tried to make a sand moat around our stuff and create our own little island. It actually worked pretty well… for a little while. After our last failed attempt there was only one thing left to do… drink mojitos and margaritas! 

Arcachon is also about an hour away from Bordeaux and I think out of the two, this was my favorite. It’s a cute little beach town that emits an appropriately relaxed mood. We wandered through the town a while and stumbled upon a lovely market with fresh produce and seafood that was all pretty much still alive. Once our stomachs started to grumble we decided to sit down at a place that had a sign announcing they served “moule frite au roquefort” AKA blue cheese mussels and OH MY GOD they were SO freaking delicious. After that, all we wanted was a siesta under the sun so we walked over to the beach to catch some rays. The tide in this one was good to us and stayed put, so we were able to relax in the perfect sand and dream about the mussels we had just devoured.