A Visit to Italy Today ???

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The plan today was to visit 2 of the “Les Plus Beaux Villages de France”.  One of the focuses of our visit to France is to visit a large number of the 100 “Most Beautiful Villages of France”.  The goal today was to see Saint-Agnes and Coaraze.  Well the turn off from A8 highway to Saint-Agnes is only 5 miles from the Italian border.  Well we all of a sudden found ourselves going over the border into Italy.  Obviously we missed a turn.  We had to go another 5 miles before we found an exit.  We took the exit and paid the $ 3.00 toll and pulled over to figure out what just happened.  I immediately figured we could just take the road going back over the highway and then find the on ramp.  Thats how it works in the US .. right …  Well we found ourselves going higher and higher into the countryside and the road getting narrower and narrower.  It becomes apparent that we were going higher and farther away from A8.  So we turned around and got back to the area we exited off A8 and determined that the on ramp back onto A8 split into a West bound on ramp also.  We were on our way back to France.

We got on the road to Saint-Agnes.  The thing about these “Les Plus Beaux Villages de France” is that they tend to be way off the main roads and also on the tops of mountains.  So the roads to these villages tend to be very narrow and steep (kinda the price you pay for them being beautiful!).  Todays road to Saint_agnes was a long and narrow road.  When we got into the town we found a wedding going on.  Here are some of the pictures from that town.

A view of the town from the road below.

A view from the town of the road we came in on…

I ordered a “Double” coffee ???

Our little Lunch Buddy ….

So Lunch is done and its off to the next of the “Les Plus Beaux Villages de France”.  More about that town in the next post…

A Week in Review from Villefranche

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Its Friday morning.  Im on the veranda watching the sun rise over the bay in Villefranche.  The week started with Bunny going to school on Monday.  She was tested to determine her level of French language knowledge.  On Tuesday they put the students in classes based on how well they did on the test.  She was put in intermediate #4 class which REALLY surprised her.  She spent the day in that level and determined that she should be in a lower level.   She talked with the instructor the on Wednesday morning and the instructor dropped her into intermediate #3.  So down just one level.  She has LOVED the instruction so far and is really enjoying the class.

For me its been exploring Nice and Villefranche.  Monday was primarily stocking the apartment with essentials.  Like food, paper products and other essentials.  The apartment was short on some of those items.  On Tuesday I took a 8 mile walk over to Nice and the Promanade.  It is the same Promanade they had the tragic event happen several years ago.  On Wednesday I walked 12 miles almost to the Nice airport along the Promanade and back to Villefranche.  Thrusday I went to Mont Alban to view the tallest point between Villefranche and Nice.  I was able to get an outstanding view of both cities.  Today I plan to take it easy and plan out our weekend travels.  Also catch up on my sleep.  I was up at 3 am to watch the Thursday night football game.

Here are some pictures from my walking over the past few days:

overlooking Villefranche sur Mer from Fort du Mont Alban

Villefranche from across the bay

 

Fort du Mont Alban

 

Nice beach and promanade.  In the distance is the airport

 

Nice from Mt Alban

A view of Las Vegas from over the Pond

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Monday October 2nd

As Bunny was leaving this morning at 8 am Nice time it was 11 pm in Las Vegas.  The news was “an active shooter in Las Vegas”.  I walked to the Carrefour for groceries and got back at 1 pm or 4 am Las Vegas time to listen to the news report 50 dead and 200 injured in a shooting.

As the news progressed on Skynews (a European based news source) the convesation quickly changed to why the US allows people to have “War weapons”  It continued through out the convesations all day as to why the US is in the grip of the NRA and allowing weapons like this in the hands of private citizens.  Meanwhile CNN and MSNBC had NO conversations about the fact that the shooter was able to own a weapon of with this Massive killing power.

Whether you agree with the fact that the US allows people to own these weapons.  Its very interesting that there isnt any debate on the news channels here in the US.  Is ti that they are afraid to “politicize” the event for fear of a backlash from the NRA or other factions.  Not sure why ….

On another note I had both CNN and Skynews going at the same time.  It was amazing how much better the news reporting was by Skynews.  They seemed to have a better handle on what was happening vs the US news orginizations.  It was weird.

I didnt want to get political on this entry just wanted to make an observation from the other side of the world on events in the US….

This is a Sad day and Tragic Events …

Travel day – and a couple of stops

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Today (Saturday) was moving day. We had been staying in Robion – at a DEElightful little apartment. Here’s a pic of the shower:

Yes, it’s in the bedroom. It was shaped like a little tower, with steps up to it. How cute is that?

Back to moving day. We decided to take the back roads to see some more of Provence. We also wanted to see a few more “plus beaux villages.” Our first stop was Moustiers-Sainte-Marie.

PHOTOS OF MOUSTIERS SHOULD GO HERE

Marty is going to have to add photos because, for some cyber-silly reason, my tablet/camera is not uploading all of my photos – only a few, like the shower, above.

Suffice it to say, this little hill town was crowded with tourists for good reason. Beautiful, medieval (and older) buildings, enchanting cobble stone lanes, a centuries-old church (for some reason, Enya was playing while we were there!), set against a backdrop of cliffs and a tiny church high up in the hills (there was a path one could walk up to it but it was a Travel Day so, after our “plat du jour” lunch of a gratinee of gnocchi and salmon with an elaborate salad, we moved on to another tres belle ville, Tourtour.

MORE PHOTOS HERE 🙂

It was a quick (but delightful) stop because we were running late to meet our new landlady in Villefranche-sur-Mer. We called and rescheduled with her and hit the road. It was WILD trying to find this place! OMG! These drivers are NUTS. And the streets are so damned narrow that it is a miracle that the roadways aren’t littered with dented cars and mangled humans.

We finally found our place – and it is lovely. Here’s a view (with raspberry rose’) from our terrace:

It’s now Sunday – I think I’ll let Marty take over with his bons mots. I need to mentally/emotionally/culturally prepare myself for my French immersion tomorrow. HELP!

Second full day of “les plus beaux villages de France”

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This morning (Friday), our destination was Lourmarin because it’s supposed to be a beautiful town AND they were having their weekly “marche” (market) and we had heard that it was to-die-for. And it was! The town itself is beyond beautiful – my favorite thus far. The first three photos below are of Lourmarin (for some reason my photos aren’t all uploading; these photos do NO do it justice!). I had a “moment” in Lourmarin – while wandering the market I came upon a trio of musicians (two guitars and a cello) playing “Hallelujah”. Ahhhhh….

The rest of the photos (below) are of Les Baux de Provence, another beautiful village with castle ruins at the very top. The very last photo is of a chapel, one of very few intact buildings that were part of the castle.

The photo of the door? Just threw that in because I love doors. 🙂 All for now.

More Roussillon photos :)

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These photos are of Roussillon. It’s called The Ochre Village because it is, er, constructed from ochre. It’s beautiful. We were there in the morning to go to the market. I have a feeling that the late afternoon sun would have shown off the amazing hues of burnished red in this delightful town better but it was still awesome in the morning. We really enjoyed walking all over Roussillon. Lovely people, lovely spot. Cute cats, too!

Jet Lag or No Jet Lag

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I was up at 5:30 am this morning (thursday Sept 28th) ready to go. After sleeping for 12 hours I have adjusted to the new time zone. That was easy. But not so fast. Around 3 pm today I was ready for bed. We were still touring towns and looking for a good place to eat. It could have been the lack of food today that had something to do with the change. We were so focused on getting out there and seeing stuff we failed to do the basics like feed ourselves.

We left the Airbnb around 9:30 am and our first stop is Roussillon because it’s market day – and French markets are outstanding. The open air markets are really wonderful places to interact with locals and see what the local culture has in store for you. We got there and parked and 2 wonderful couples from Michigan helped us with the parking meter (and even gave us 30 centimes because we didn’t have enough change!). Our first glimpse of the market was a musician singing a wonderful French song overlooking the valley below. The market was in a parking lot between 2 spectacular vistas. The town is perched on a hilltop and you can see for miles and miles around the countryside.

We wandered around the market where they displayed everything from prescription glasses to anchovies. They had an olive bar, lots of scarves and dresses, vegetables, and bread and jams. It is wonderful to see all of the items but just as fun is to watch the people and listen to the conversations. Trying to pick up where people are from. Its a BEAUTIFUL day and its time for coffee and donuts … I mean Croissants. Bunny asked someone for a suggestion as to where we may find a nice cafe for a cafe’ practicing her French language. We were directed to a nice little cafe’ we a gorgeous view over looking the valley below.

After a little coffee .. I mean LITTLE ..

we were off to explore the town of Roussillion. The town actually sits above the market so it was an uphill climb. We toured the town and then off to the next destination. Our next visit is to a town called Gordes. not more than 15 minutes away. The town looks spectacular from just outside the city, but we got inside and it was crowded with cars and people. We did a little picture taking and wandering around and then its time for a late lunch.

The main attraction next to Gordes is the Abbey. So we visit that and then the next little Beautiful town not to far away was Vesanques. So we set our sites on that town. It turned out to be VERY small with no real amenities for food. We were now in food mode. It was 3 pm and we had neglected our need for food. I was tired and hungry. So we headed toward Menerbes. A nice town on the other side of Robion from where we were. After some wrong turns we finally were on the way. We parked and walked up to find a nice little restaurant ( by nice I mean “OPEN”) and sat in the courtyard and had Omelettes and salad. It was really nice to sit and talk and watch people milling around the town. We had our meal, toured the town and now its time to call it a day. I am bushed. The jet lag had caught up to me. We got in the car and drove back to the Airbnb and I was asleep by 5:30 pm. Hopefully I will catch up soon Tomorrow is another full day of driving. (More on driving in France tomorrow .. I love driving here).

Au Revoir

We Made It !!!

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We flew into Nice at 10 am (Nice time) or 2 am portland time. We left Portland at 7 am so thats 19 hours of travel time. We flew 51 minutes to Vancouver BC. Then we flew to Montreal. Around a 4 hour flight. We had just over an hour layover and then a 7 hour flight to Nice. It seems much easier when the flights are broken up into smaller chunks.

When we got in we immediately grabed a bus to downtown Nice and got our rental car and got out of Nice. Extremely hungry and tired we stopped at a truck stop and got chicken sandwich and fries at McDonnalds. Hopefully the last time we are gonna have to do that. We then closed our eyes for 30 minutes and caught up on our sleep a little then got back on the road to finish our 2 1/2 hour drive to Robion France. We had rented an Airbnb for 3 nights in Robion which is in an area with some other beautiful little french towns which we will be touring over the next few days. We arrived around 4 pm. We were given a tour of the rental by Michelle and settled in. We took inventory and determined we needed to go to the local market for some items. In particular marty forgot his toothbrush.

After a trip to the store we hit the hay around 5:30 and now its 5:30 am and it seems like the 12 hours of sleep resolved my jet lag. Bunnys still sleeping. Its GREAT to have that plane ride done. Really excited about the travel coming over the next few weeks ….

Off to France

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Bunny and I will be spending October in France this year.  She is going to French Immersion school the first 2 weeks we are there and then we will be traveling around France for the next 3 weeks.  We fly into Nice and her class starts a couple of days later in Villefranche-sur-Mer.  We will then travel to the Brittany area of France which is in the NW corner.  We will be staying in a town called Rochefort-en-Terre.  It is quite a drive from Nice but it is a beautiful area we want to visit.  We will then be traveling back towards Nice to an area around Toulouse a town called Estang.  Then back to Nice and fly out at the end of the month.

Voila! 🙂

While we are there we will be meeting up with Bunny’s friend Greta (in Brittany) and, perhaps, Bunny’s sister Shelley in Estaing. (Shelley is currently walking the Camino de Santiago!)

Our goals? Besides learning a bit more French, they are: to see beautiful medieval towns, eat fantastic French food, visit as many boulangeries as possible, and have some French adventures! C’est tout!