Road trip from Barcelona to La Rochelle

The road trip from Barcelona to La Rochelle takes 10 hours with regular stops and lunch. It’s very advisable to make a stop in Carcassonne and/or the Bordeaux region to make your trip even more unforgettable.

This was the perfect break, I love La Rochelle, the windy and unpredictable weather of the Atlantic Ocean, and the stunning architecture in this medieval city. Much of it in fact, is intact and it’s just a pleasure to wonder around, peak in the many churches, and get lost in the old town.

It was in May 2019 when we realised how foodie La Rochelle had become. And we couldn’t wait to be back together to try more restaurants.

It was also another foodie trip for us, as we had three fantastic dinners and one lovely lunch. I still can’t believe how lucky we were to find these four gems. Although truth to be told, we did do our home work 😁

On the first night we met B’s dad at the pub and opted for galettes and crepes, one of my favourite foods, at ‘La galettiere’, next door from McEwan’s in the enchanting neighbourhood of ‘La chaine’.

I started with a galette complete, the most popular galette, consisting of melted emmenthal, ham and a nice fried egg, washed down with a bio local beer.

Dessert was a simple crepe with lemon and sugar for me, while B and his dad had one with caramel and salted butter ice cream…yummmmm

The second night B booked a table at ‘Les pecheurs’, one of the best seafood bistros in the same neighbourhood.

The service was relaxed, the menu focussed on local high quality seafood and we ordered with no hesitancy.

THE biggest seafood platter, for three people. There were langoustines, oysters (La Rochelle and l’Ile de Res are some of the best producers in Europe for oysters), crab, crevette grises, whelk or ‘bulot’ in French, (some kind of sea snails) and some other smaller snails, periwinkle (my hubby just found the translation from French to English). I tried oysters for the first time and I loved them; I won’t lie, I had been wanted but being scared to try them for a long time and I am so happy I finally did as I really enjoyed them!!

Third and last night we had dinner opposite McEwans (yes, we stayed in the same neighbourhood once again), and had another delicious seafood-based dinner at ‘Isèo – le Bistrot de la mer’.

We were not as lucky with the weather as it was wet and cold for most the two full days we were there. However we managed to enjoy a couple of hours of dry weather and walk down the coast from the centre, which was super lovely. You may also agree that the clouds made the place fascinating.

Here some pictures of our walks around La Rochelle.