Bordeaux, France

Day 1

• Place de la Bourse and the Miroir d'eau

  The Miroir d'eau is not always on: it works in cycles, alternating three centimetres of still water with a mist and then draining, and between cycles it is a dry slab of granite. Anyone arriving at the wrong moment sees nothing and assumes it is broken. It runs in the warm season and is switched off in winter against frost. The perfect mirror of the facade lasts a few minutes per cycle: that is the moment for the photograph, and it is better to wait for it than to chase it.

• Saint-André Cathedral

  The church is free to enter; you pay only for the Tour Pey-Berland, the bell tower standing apart from the cathedral, €9 full and €7.50 reduced. The point almost nobody uses: it is free up to the age of 25 for residents of the European Union, and free for everyone on the first Sunday of the month from November to March. In autumn and winter the tower closes at midday and reopens at 2pm, so the 12.30-2pm window is dead.

• Porte Cailhau

  It is the only medieval civic monument in Bordeaux you can go inside, and it is small: four levels linked by a narrow spiral stair, and you are out again in about twenty minutes. The ticket costs 7 € full and 5 € reduced, free under 13 when accompanied and free for everyone on the first Sunday of the month, July and August excepted. From April to October it opens daily 10:00-13:00 and 14:00-18:00; from November to March only Wednesday to Friday 14:00-18:00 and at weekends 11:00-13:00 and 14:00-18:00, with last entry half an hour before. The stairs are many and narrow and there is no lift, so anyone with mobility problems skips it. It was built between 1493 and 1495 to mark a victory of Charles VIII, and it does look like a Loire château dropped onto a city gate.

Day 2

• Grand Théâtre

  The 1780 opera house can only be visited on a guided tour or by buying a ticket for a performance: there is no open admission, and anyone turning up expecting to walk in and see the staircase stays outside. That staircase is the one Garnier took up for the Paris Opéra, and it is the reason for the visit. Twelve Corinthian columns on the front, with the nine Muses and three goddesses on the roof: you can count them from the square, and that is the only part you see without a ticket.

• Cité du Vin

  The ticket costs between 17.60 € and 22 € depending on the option and always includes a glass of wine at the Belvédère, the panoramic top floor at 35 metres: it is not an extra to buy, it is already in, and depending on the ticket you get one or two glasses, chosen from around fifteen wines or an organic grape juice. People who do not know this leave it behind. The route is multisensory and takes about 2 hours; it is 20 minutes from the centre on the tram along the Garonne. It opens daily from 10:00, and besides 25 December it closes for the last week of January, which is the annual maintenance and almost never appears in guidebooks. It is not a winery: you do not buy wine by the barrel, you learn how to drink it.

• Rue Sainte-Catherine

  It is 1.2 km of straight pedestrian street, from Place de la Comédie to Place de la Victoire, and it is the longest pedestrian shopping street in Europe. What that means in practice should be said: it is a 20 minute walk between international chains, so as an experience it is worth little, but as an axis for orientation it is worth a lot. It cuts the centre in two, and from it you turn off into the real quarters, Saint-Pierre to the east and Saint-Michel to the south.

Day 1

• Chartrons district✦ hidden gem

  This is the wine merchants' quarter, where the Bordeaux trade actually happened: 18th-century warehouses with high ceilings, now galleries, natural wine bars and brocante shops. On Sunday mornings there is the market along the quays, which is when the quarter fills with locals rather than visitors. It sits north of the centre, twenty minutes on foot along the river from Place de la Bourse, and it is the part of town where bar prices come down.

• Pont de Pierre✦ hidden gem

  It is the first masonry bridge built across the Garonne at Bordeaux, ordered by Napoleon, and it has 17 arches: as many as the letters in Napoléon Bonaparte. It is closed to cars and crossed on foot or by bike: from the middle you get the head-on view of the continuous frontage of the quays, the image of Bordeaux that aerial photographs do not convey. At sunset the sun comes from behind the city, so the right light is the morning's.

• Marché des Capucins✦ hidden gem

  This is the market where the people of Bordeaux have oysters and a glass of white for breakfast, and that is not a figure of speech: the oyster counters serve from the morning and people eat standing at the bar before ten. It is a neighbourhood market, not a converted food hall, and it closes in the early afternoon like every French covered market. It is in the Saint-Michel quarter, south of the centre, and it is where you eat well for half what you pay on the quays.

Day 2

• Saint-Émilion and vineyard tastings

  The village is about 35 minutes by train from Bordeaux Saint-Jean, but the station is outside it and there is a couple of km of climbing: without a car the transfer has to be planned, or you take a shuttle. Tastings at the châteaux must be booked, you cannot just walk in; the village tourist office arranges the cellar visits. Beneath the village is the monolithic church cut into the rock, visitable only with a guide and at fixed times.

• Canelés

  The canelé has a dark, almost burnt crust and a soft heart of vanilla and rum custard: the crust is not burnt by accident, it is caramelised in a copper mould greased with beeswax. It has to be eaten the same day, because by the next the crust softens and the point of the thing is gone. The historic pâtisseries also sell a small version, which costs little and lets you try one without committing: that is what locals do.

Day 1

• Canelés

  The canelé has a dark, almost burnt crust and a soft heart of vanilla and rum custard: the crust is not burnt by accident, it is caramelised in a copper mould greased with beeswax. It has to be eaten the same day, because by the next the crust softens and the point of the thing is gone. The historic pâtisseries also sell a small version, which costs little and lets you try one without committing: that is what locals do.

• Arcachon basin oysters

  The cabanes of the Arcachon basin are oyster farmers' huts where you eat on benches, with a plate of oysters, bread, butter and a glass of white: they are not restaurants and many cook nothing else. It is an hour by train from Bordeaux Saint-Jean. The seasonal rule the French know and visitors do not: oysters are eaten all year, but in the warm months they are milky because they are spawning, and the taste changes a great deal.

• Marché des Capucins✦ hidden gem

  This is the market where the people of Bordeaux have oysters and a glass of white for breakfast, and that is not a figure of speech: the oyster counters serve from the morning and people eat standing at the bar before ten. It is a neighbourhood market, not a converted food hall, and it closes in the early afternoon like every French covered market. It is in the Saint-Michel quarter, south of the centre, and it is where you eat well for half what you pay on the quays.