Let me tell you about “my” city.

I never planned on living in Bordeaux

Like, at all.

I never thought it would become anything close to “home” either.

Actually, I don’t even really know what home means.

Not in a fake deep way.

Not in the cliché traveler way where people say “home is wherever the heart is” and then post a picture of an airport window or whatever.

I mean it literally.

I’ve traveled too much, moved too much and lived in too many different places to tie that word neatly to one city, one country, one childhood street or one fixed point on a map.

Some people have that.

A place they come from.

A place that explains them.

A place they can point to and say, yeah, that’s home.

I don’t really have that.

So when I say Bordeaux became important to me, I don’t mean it became home in the normal sense.

I just mean it’s one of the rare places where staying made sense.

And for me, that’s already a lot.

Somehow, over the years, Bordeaux ended up being the place I stayed the longest. Funny how these things play out huh?

What’s also interesting is that it wasn’t because I woke up one day and thought, yes, this is the city where I’m going to build my life, or a part of it.

It just kept making sense to stay a little longer.

Then a little longer again.

I’ve been in France on and off for around 20 years now, which is actually mad when I write it down.

At one point I studied in Lyon, and listen, Lyon is beautiful. I’m not one of those people who pretends a city is ugly just because I didn’t connect with it.

Lyon has history, architecture, culture, food, all that heavy old French city stuff.

But I never felt at comfortable there.

In fact, when I left Lyon, I genuinely thought I was done with France entirely.

Then one day I drove through Bordeaux and that was kind of it.

Immediate click.

No long intellectual analysis.

No checklist.

No “let me compare quality of life, transport, rent and cultural infrastructure.”

Just a feeling.

Like, ok, I get this place.

That’s it.

And I don’t get many places like that.

Bordeaux is beautiful, but not in a loud way.

That’s probably one of the main reasons I like it.

It doesn’t scream at you.

It’s not trying to be Paris. It’s not trying to impress you with giant towers, endless glass buildings or some fake futuristic skyline.

There are no skyscrapers eating the sky.

No weird corporate city-centre energy making you feel like you accidentally walked into someone’s LinkedIn profile.

There’s light.

There’s air.

There are streets that don’t feel like they’re closing in on you.

If you’ve lived in big cities, you know how quickly you can lose the sky.

Everything becomes concrete, traffic, glass, noise, pigeons, people walking too fast, cars everywhere, buildings blocking every bit of openness.

Bordeaux doesn’t feel like that.

At least not to me.

It feels softer.

The town hall is genuinely beautiful.

The old churches too.

The bridges, the stone buildings, the river, the way the city catches light when the weather changes.

Walking around the centre feels visually calm in a way most cities don’t.

Not perfect.

Not magical.

Just soft.

And I like that.

The funny thing too is that a lot of people in Bordeaux aren’t even really from Bordeaux.

They come from nearby towns, the Arcachon Bay, Paris, other parts of France and sometimes from somewhere else entirely, like me.

So the city has this mixed energy.

It feels small on paper but bigger socially.

A medium-sized city that doesn’t feel too closed, too provincial or too stuck in itself.

That works for me.

Culture is everywhere too, but again, not in a try-hard way.

Montaigne, Montesquieu, Mauriac, universities, opera, theatres.

That whole old intellectual background is just there.

And yeah, that sounds a bit like something from a tourist office brochure, but you do feel it.

Not every day.

Not every second.

But it sits in the background.

Also, random fact, Bordeaux was the capital of France three times.

Most people don’t know that.

I love facts like that.

But honestly, one of the best things about Bordeaux is how easily you can leave it.

Which sounds like an insult, but it really isn’t.

The ocean is just over an hour away.

And not the kind of beach where you’ve got buildings stacked behind the sand, overpriced ice cream stands and people sitting on top of each other.

I’m talking long Atlantic coastlines, dunes, pine forests, surf towns, wind, space.

A completely different rhythm.

You leave the city and suddenly your body remembers that life doesn’t have to feel so tight all the time.

Then further south you’ve got the Pyrenees. Sure, they’re about 3 hours-drive away, but still, close enough for a weekend getaway.

Mountains, lakes, hikes, waterfalls, caves, little villages.

A totally different landscape again.

And if you drive inland, say to the Dordogne, you find quiet villages, old mills, open plains and places where everything just slows down without asking for permission.

Bordeaux is one of those cities where a short drive can completely change your environment.

That matters to me.

I need nature around me.

Not as an aesthetic.

Not as a weekend hobby.

I genuinely think I get tense without it.

Travel is surprisingly easy too for a city this size.

You’ve got flights to a lot of major European cities.

Paris, London, Lisbon, Madrid, Barcelona, Rome, Istanbul and more.

North Africa is close too, especially Morocco.

Then the TGV gets you to Paris in about two hours, which still feels a bit unreal when you think about it.

From there, everything connects.

You’ve also got trains to Toulouse, Nantes, La Rochelle and other places, plus coaches if you want to travel more slowly into Spain or Portugal.

The city gives you options.

I like places that give you options.

The weather has its own personality.

It rains a lot, like, A LOT, and people complain about it, but I’ve never really hated Bordeaux rain.

Most of the time it doesn’t feel violent or miserable. Not to me anyway.

It feels more like a reset.

Like the city needed to rinse itself off a little.

Summers though?

Yeah.

Summers can be rough.

Sometimes too hot.

I usually leave during peak heat when I can, because Bordeaux in a heatwave is not my favorite version of Bordeaux, that’s for sure.

Still, the center has character.

Small local shops, thrift stores, cafés, concept stores, cobblers, vinyl shops, second hand electronics, markets.

There’s even a monthly vegan market, which is rare enough to matter in a city this size.

It’s relatively clean and relatively safe too.

People argue about safety a lot, especially online, because apparently everything has to become a dramatic debate now.

But in normal day to day life, compared to many urban places, Bordeaux still feels fairly balanced.

Public transport is decent.

Not perfect.

Rush hour can be annoying.

The tramway gets packed.

Buses can be a bit much sometimes.

But overall, it works.

And the city is walkable, which changes everything. A city you can walk through is not the same as a city you only pass through.

Cycling is easy too. You can get almost anywhere by bike, which makes owning one feel less like a lifestyle choice and more like common sense.

There’s greenery as well. Parks, trees, open little pockets of space.

Not enough trees in the very heart of the city in my opinion, and still too many cars, obviously.

But the base is solid.

Now, let’s not romanticise it too much.

Bordeaux has problems.

Rent is ridiculous for what the city offers in terms of work.

Transport isn’t cheap.

Bike theft is very real.

Summers can be intense.

And there’s this strange seasonal emptiness where a lot of people leave during summer, especially since many residents aren’t originally from there.

The city kind of exhales and partially empties out.

Some people hate that.

I get it.

It can feel peaceful, but also a bit strange, like everyone quietly agreed to disappear at the same time.

Vegan options are still limited compared to bigger cities too.

Manageable, but limited.

So no, Bordeaux isn’t perfect.

No city is.

And honestly, I don’t even live there anymore.

We moved away to a coastal town a couple of years ago. We’re just over an hour away, but still.

I go back almost weekly to volunteer, see friends, run errands or just walk around for a few hours.

And every time, there’s still something.

Not home exactly, but Bordeaux is one of the few places that ever made me understand why people use that word.

Maybe that’s enough.

Peace and blessing.