“It was a hot summer night and the beach was burning...” Isn’t that how the Meat Loaf song goes? Unfortunately there hadn’t been many of those nights, which is pretty much unheard of around Arcachon, south-west France, in early August (writes Suzie Larcombe). Who knows why the weather had gone against us - maybe because we were such a mixed gang? Maybe because we shouldn’t really have tried to holiday ensemble? 

Picture the setting: only 20 minutes' drive south of Arcachon (which itself is just under an hour’s drive from Bordeaux, with its array of international flight options) you’ll find Moulleau village, with its beach-side location and café bar culture to satisfy the hungriest vulture. Restaurants range from top notch to oyster shacks and few will disappoint. You’ll find the shopping cool, casual and stylish: boho chic standing shoulder to shoulder with haute couture (with the occasional, but never cheesy nautical twist). In terms of activities, you’ll never be left looking for something to do, whether it’s exploring on horseback, riding the waves or trekking in the immense forests of Les Landes. So, whether you enjoy luxury or laid back, this part of the Gironde in south-west France will not disappoint. 

There’s something about Moulleau village, something about the Yatt hotel (apart from its great comfort to price ratio): something that transports me to holiday mode just by thinking about them (even now on a damp February morning). With its street-side cafés and quirky but quality restaurants, Moulleau village is the weekend stomping ground of the glitterati of Bordeaux. They come in droves with their suntans, convertibles and nautical attire. They look as if they were born to weekend by the sea; born to wear flip flops and just do beach stuff, completely naturally. Anyway, what I’m trying to say is that this neck of the woods just oozes French style.

We normally come here as a small group of four to do a bit of café society and recharge our people-watching batteries, but this visit is different. We’re now hunting in a pack. Holiday hunting in a pack… Good idea or bad, who knows? There’s eight of us with eight sets of needs. So far, the shopping need has been partially fulfilled, the café society need partly satisfied, the surfing need…. But we’re all currently left, a bit, well… wanting – all because of some disappointing weather. Add insult to injury and the rain starts. Rain, in our experience, in south-west France, in August, is virtually unheard of (except for the odd spectacular storm). It’s time for a radical move.

The Dune du Pyla (sometimes known as Pilat) is Europe’s largest sand dune with a mind-blowing volume of 60,000,000 m³; measuring around 500 metres wide (from east to west) by three kilometres long (from north to south), and a height of 107 metres above sea level - it truly is one of the unofficial wonders of the world. Well-known and loved by the tourist board of south-west France (because of the number of tourists it attracts), well-known and loved by those weekend Bordelaise (for reasons you’re about to find out), and totally unknown to us. How exciting can a pile of sand be, after all? Anyway, off we head. About 10 kilometres down the coast, travelling in convoy (each having retreated to the security of our own cars to exhale some of the frustration of this holiday, which is so far not ticking anybody’s boxes), we arrive. 

We arrive. OK. A forest park-style car park with a bit of a log cabin selling tat. This could just about put the “tin lid” (as my mother used to say) on this holiday. There’s tons of cars, tons of folk, but we are yet to see the attraction. Maybe those incredibly high pine trees were planted by God as a natural curtain for the grande spectacle which lies ahead? Maybe? We walk in line (as the paths are narrow and in keeping with the natural forest look) then there it is… A wall of sand the height of a Glasgow tenement (and maybe even higher). With no one to tell you what to do, how to behave or how to react, this one’s got us all stumped.

We see a flight of stairs up the steep side of the sand bank, and what’s more we see total and utter idiots throwing themselves off the top and running down a toute vitesse (at top speed). Some are so totally bonkers that they’re doing it with little kids on their shoulders - surely they need locking up? We seem to have left reality behind and wound up in some sort of outdoor madhouse. With none of our pack really knowing what to say or do, we file along obediently and climb the steep stairs. I can’t speak for anyone else, but I’m silently wondering what we’re doing here. Three-quarters of the way up, Tom (the rugby dude of the pack) announces that he’s going to be the first to throw himself off the top. “You’ll kill yourself” is the almost choral response from the other seven members of this pack.

A man of his word, and to our total and utter amazement, within seconds of hitting the top step he’s gone… All arms and legs, head bobbing up and down and yelling. In true pack animal style and without a brain cell between us (it would seem) we follow…

The feeling is, well, sensational. The angle is nigh on 80 degrees, the sand comes about knee deep, so you have to sort of can-can your knees up to your chin to keep the momentum going, but it’s like nothing else any of us have ever done before. It’s only about three-quarters of the way down that it even (momentarily) crosses your mind to think about how you’ll stop. Then the inner child takes over again and you think: stuff it, just keep on going and enjoy! I guess it’s a bit like those team building things you do, which you know are mad, but something drives you on nonetheless. Except here, it’s just for you. Only you.

Safely on terra firma, we swap stories, each trying to outdo the others on the uncontrollable madness that brimmed up inside us and took us over while we were projecting ourselves down this natural sand phenomenon. In true pack style we troupe back up the narrow flight of stairs to do it again, again and again. The penultimate mount however stopped us in our tracks. On the other ascents, the wind had been blowing a hoolie (a good Scottish expression for a really strong wind), but this time it had stopped and suddenly we were greeted at the top of the stairs with a scene from Laurence of Arabia.  The adrenalin had clearly sent us potty and we now believed we were in the Sahara. The sand appears smooth and caramel, like a well-iced cake stretching ahead of us to a seamless point where it met an Atlantic that stretches forever to meet an azure sky. How could we have missed this on the other ascents? “Gob smacked” is the expression, I think, for how we were.  

Throughout the afternoon, alternating hoolies and hot, hot sun came and went, sandblasting us and scorching us in equal measure, but it was done. Mission accomplished. This pack had found its place, a million miles from anywhere any of us had (or even could have) ever imagined. A million miles from shopping, surfing, rugby or café culture, but a spot which has etched itself into our memories forever nonetheless. 

About the author

Suzie Larcombe is author of “The missing link?” and joint director of LimeGray (www.LimeGray.com) - the small rural business development agency with the big city feel.