About Annecy

 

Yesterday I watched a cooking show on TV, that is not something I would normally do but as it was about French cooking I was curious to see more and then when the presenter/chef announced that he would be in Annecy I decided to stick with it as I have just recently been sharing photos from the area.

It was nice to see the sights that I remembered from my visit as he drove along the same roads I had driven along. As the presenter sang the praises of the local produce, artisans and food I thought that my next post (this one) would focus on the town and its restaurants.

However, although I have some nice shots of the town, as I hope you will agree, they were all taken fairly early in the day so the restaurants were not open or had not yet started serving lunch and everywhere was pretty quiet, save for a few people taking a coffee break at a local bar. Given how cold it was it was surprising to find even these few people sat outside. 

Nevertheless I think these images do show what a beautiful place Annecy is and why it is worth a visit, whatever the weather.

View from the Lake

 So today's images were taken on Lac d'Annecy. We took a boat cruise along the length of the lake from a jetty on the edge of the town.

As you can see it was dull and overcast and it was very windy but that made for  quite a dramatic image, especially with the Chateau de Duingt in the foreground. This is a private residence but I believe there are tea rooms there and the venue is used for concerts and weddings.

The peninsula which houses the Chateau was once an island and has been occupied for 1000 years and was the site of a medieval fortress known as Chateauvieux. If you visit https://chateaudeduingt.fr you will discovery more of the history of the place as well as find some beautiful photos captured when the weather conditions were more favourable.

The third image was one of just a handful of wildlife pictures I took on the road trip and is of a Red Crested Pochard. It is probably quite easy to tell how it got its descriptive name.

Lac d'Annecy

 On my road trip after leaving Florence I drove through Pisa, I saw the leaning tower but did not stop to explore the town as time on this leg was tight. There was an interesting drive along the Ligurian coast and then inland via some exciting mountain roads to  a small town called Casale Monferrato in Alessandria, on the banks of the River Po where I stayed overnight. It was a lovely town but for some reason the only photos I took were using  my mobile phone and I don't have any to hand to share on here.

From there I drove to Courmayeur and then through the Mont Blanc Tunnel to Chamonix and then on to Lac d'Annecy where I stayed in a lodge on the edge of the lake just a few metres from the jetty in the images above.

This was in June 2018, in Italy the summer was in full swing and it had been hot and sunny the whole time. In fact apart from the thunderstorm and landslide outside of Dresden early on in the trip the weather had been nothing but hot. So it was a bit of a shock to the system arriving in Annecy where it was cold, and overcast. It was a welcome respite for my son however as he had caught a little too much sun in the preceding days so he welcomed the cooler conditions.

The town of Annecy is very picturesque and is a popular destination for French holiday makers all year round, for the lake in summer and the ski slopes nearby in the winter. 

These shots were taken in the early evening and as the clouds rolled in it was very atmospheric, albeit quite chilly.