it might be the scenery and/or the traffic… everyone has their own preferences… 
Wow! The scenery around the Lot / Garonne valleys is glorious. They are two such different rivers - The Lot with its steep ravines. The Garonne with its wide-open flood plains and huge skies - no way could this part of the L&G scenery be called “less enjoyable”.
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I tend to agree with SuePJ. During our eight day trip we covered the greater part of the drpartment looking at properties and found it equally pleasant and pretty much traffic free wherever we were which is why I was somewhat mystified by Houpla’s comment in the first instance.
Sure, the roads might be a bit straighter and faster in the Garonne valley, including of course the A62 but other than that…
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I couldn’t live in Agen (did a 20 year stretch in London and am cured of cities for life), but it’s always got something going on and there’s every flavour of French store and business type.
It also has all the medical facilities one could ever wish for with the only downside being the lack of rural MTs.
The weather has been all or nothing this year in SE 47. All sun or no sun, no rain or building an Ark. I’m currently eyeing up a fording kit for my Duster in case it keeps raining.
Regarding cars, unless you live on an RD and only drive on RDs, you’ll want something with good ground clearance than you don’t mind getting muddy. The un-numbered rural back roads and communal chemins require users to pull one wheel onto the verge in both directions to pass in many places and you’ll soon learn what’s a decent verge and what’s a ditch hidden by long grass.
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Good idea also to have a car with a spare wheel and a good jack. The number of punctures we’ve had in our sixteen years here runs into double figures! Even the decent verges hide long nails and mysterious short pieces of kerbstone. Modern low profile tyres that you’re supposed to be able to inject some foam into are awful.
We still have our 28 year-old RHD merc that we brought with us from the UK and I love driving it on our country lanes because I can see exactly how close to the edge I can take the car when something is coming towards me.
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We had visitors this summer that rented a Nissan Juke. Ridiculous low profile tyres that belong on a hot hatch, not a compact SUV/crossover.
Catches a high curb next to a drain and front right type deflates. Pulls into carpark across the road to clear traffic. Boot contains tyre foam and inflator. No spare, no jack and no wheelbrace.
Not much help when there’s an L-shaped tear in the sidewall that you can stick your whole hand into. Luckily we were only 20 minutes away and I have all the tools required, so I took the husband to Feu Vert and Herself took the wife and her 2 year old to Aldi.
Top Tip: Get yourself to somewhere that sell 1/4” thick aluminium checker/deck plate and get a 6” square piece to put in your car’s boot.
Why? Because you will either be jacking your car up on dirt, gravel, sand or semi molten tarmac and you don’t want the jack sinking.
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I’m surprised Marmande is getting such a bad press. I wouldn’t want to live in the centre of any of the towns around here - except perhaps Bordeaux, but Marmande “works” for us in terms of a town to visit.
The old part of town has some interesting narrow alleyways with good restaurants - cheap and cheerful pizza and crepe places up to something more special. From there it’s only a short walk down onto Filhole plain alongside the river - great for walking the dog on a hot summer’s evening and where there is an enormous rock festival every summer. Walk in the other direction and find the cloister gardens by the church and then only a step away from an excellent creperie. Head out along the Bordeaux road and there is a wealth of good shopping and a very chic restaurant. Shops from the small (a good fabric shop, a lovely Casa, a bio place) to the large - Lidls, a big Leclerc, large brico stores. Turn towards Virazeil (excellent bakery) and walk the dog round the lake or head up into the hills towards Beaupuy.
We visit Marmande for the merc garage, a good rental outlet and our optician. An excellent young surgeon comes in weekly from the eye hospital in Bordeaux and he did OH’s cataract. The hospital has a urologist who visits from Agen (who operated on my OH). It has a useful train station with local trains which make a good connection with the TGV in Bordeaux and on then up to Paris. It’s an easy 10 minutes from the A62.
We find nothing “a bit grim” about the place. (Mind you, when I first drove out of Villeneuve 16 years ago from the hotel I’d stayed in in Pujols I said to myself “I could never live here!” Well I got that wrong. 
)
Of course it is quite possible that I got Marmande “wrong” but having toured the usual beautiful sites…Duras, Monflanquin, Nerac, etc. the day or so before our visit, it did seem a bit below par to us. However, it was chucking it down, there was some seedy fairground in town and we had probably the worst cafe creme ever. We also walked up to the cloisters gardens and there were definitely some right dodgy characters hanging out there, so much so that we promptly left.
However, having read SuePJ’ s account and also having been told by an estate agent that they really like the place we shall obviously give it another go.
So…given that everywhere is lovely and that the roads and ditches are equally amenable throughout we still have to decide where to concentrate our search. I have a feeling that it will be the house itself rather than the town/sector that wins the day.
I quite understand if you were seeing all these attractive places the day before, but for me (as I’ve said before) there is a world of difference between a place that one visits whilst on holiday (or even, for that matter as a second home) and a place where one lives 24/7. Beautiful places like Duras one can visit any time, but does it have a convenient brico store? is there somewhere you can go out to eat on a wet November evening? is there a doctor / vet on call? When I was looking one estate agent said to me “you’ll love this place, it’s beautiful and there is this artists’ community”. The village was pretty it’s true. Fortunately I saw it in March. Everywhere was shut. There was a man up a ladder outside a restaurant and I knew I was looking at a place that only came alive in the summer when tourists are around. Places like Marmande may be scruffy but by heck they function all year round. And there will be more than one place that does cafe creme.
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As I readily agreed Sue I am sure that we just visited Marmande on a day that was not ideal. When it is lashing it down anywhere is pretty grim.
I also totally agree regarding location which is why I am strongly favouring Nerac over Lauzun. However…just to get out of Brittany I may have to compromise and settle for the latter.
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Some thoughts on Lauzun …
Do you like good / interesting restaurants? There is an amazing one in Lauzun. Not to everyone’s taste but we loved the wonderful experimentation with unusual herbs and spices. at the moment they are between names - used to be Gostar, they are now calling it Clement. Issigeac, just up the road also has a couple of good restos.
You’re not far from Miramont which has a wonderful summer weekend - usually in July - called Bastid’art. Masses of street theatre, acrobats, music - such fun.
Bergerac airport is so convenient for friends visiting.
St Pardoux just down the road has a good / big Intermache - nothing fancy but has a good choice. There’s an okish Bricomarche alongside.
Miramont has a Lidls and a Gamm Vert. For serious shopping and markets and choice of restos Bergerac is only half an hour away and they have a super Jardiland garden centre on the ring road just by the road that comes in from the airport.
You can’t compare Agen with London, it’s a town of a bit over 30 thousand people!!!
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I’ve lost the plot as to why you want to get out of Brittany? Always best when somewhere pulls you, rather than being pushed…
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No one is pushing or pulling me out of Brittany.
I have lived in various countries and historically have moved onto a new advebture every five to seven years. For some reason we have been in Brittany for about fifteen years and, as friends say, I must have been content here to have remained so long. That aside I have been feeling restless and the recent trip to Lot and Garonne invoked memories of five happy years in the Languedoc and confirmed my suspicion that I am possibly more of a ‘southerner’ than a ‘northener’. There is a whole different ‘vibe’. Either way I am very happy in France and wish to remain here for another thirty years if I can make it that far.
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Thanks for that input Sue. Its good to know that life in Lauzan will be bearable if I lose the battle.
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Hello again, I’ll probably get flak for this, but hey ho…my driving comments were a reflection on the number of radars (fixed and portable), gendarme controls and speed bumps which are very much more ubiquitous in the north of the département than the south. I’m not advocating breaking laws or limits but personally I find it wearing having to spend more time looking at the verges and my speedo than the road and other traffic, never mind the scenery
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Perhaps, given the current weather they’re probably being blown out rather than pushed…
Well blown out on a river of fallen tree limbs would be more exact. There is still a fair amount of debris on the country roads.
I am pleased that you returned to clarify your point. When I think back there are a fair few number of speed bumps but as we have loads up here I didn’t take much account. There was one particular one in Fongrave where we were staying that caught me out a few times as it was effectively unmarked due to shrubbery.
I agree that these and speed cameras do take some of the fun out of driving but have to admit that they serve a purpose.
Even with speed cameras there’s a crash on my road to work about every 10 days on average, usually minor, fortunately.
I loathe driving to work in the dark, that’s when those accidents usually happen - I’m not a fan of driving home in the dark either but the mornings are worse.
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