Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper is visiting France at the moment to attend the 90th anniversary of the Battle of Vimy Ridge that will take place tomorrow on April 9th. Here are some links relating to the Battle of Vimy Ridge for those of you interested in history:
We stayed home today to wait for the IBM repair-man to show up to fix my broken laptop. Unfortunately, late in the day, IBM called to inform me that they had ordered the wrong part and that they wouldn’t be able to help me until Tuesday. It’s a little bit dissapointing but at least I have my mom’s laptop to use in the meantime. And I am in France…so its hard to get too upset about it.
Despite staying home we had a very nice afternoon. My aunt Carole and her family brought over some lunch consisting of nice breads, pâté, prawns, and various deli meats and cheeses. Definitely a french-style lunch and it was delicious, especially the cheese. I’ve tried quite a few cheeses since arriving and they are all so good. Since it was sunny and about 20 celcius we ate outside on the patio. Life is good!!
Jacques, the husband of the lady who runs this gite (vacation home) raises various types of birds such as pigeons, and chickens and he regularly enters competitions with these animals. This is much like dog competitions in Canada where you have these perfect pure-bred dogs except that instead of dogs, we’re talking about pigeons and chickens. We had a chance to speak to Jacques today about this hobby of his. Many of the pigeons that he raises are homing pigeons and some of his birds are capable of travelling 1500 KM to return to their home location. They perform this amazing feat through some sort of built in compass which allows the pigeons to detect the earth’s magnetic field. Too cool. We watched in awe as Jacques let out groups of these birds to fly off together. They travelled as a flock in circles above the house in groups of 20 or so and then returned to their coups shortly after Jacques blew his whistle. The birds seem to think of Jacques as father figure. They seem completely comfortable when he picks them up and they don’t offer any resistance or show any stress at all. Its quite something to see and Liam and Emma were quite fascinated by all of this.
Jacques also has chickens that lay dark brown chocolate-coloured eggs. These eggs are much darker and richer in colour than the typical brown eggs one finds in the supermarket. Apparently these hens are of a special breed and are called Marans hens. The eggs produced by Marans hens are extremely tasty according to Jacques.
Just before dinner I snuk away for my first bike ride in France. There’s a nearby hill, whose grade is 15 percent, thats been taunting me for the last few days and so I decided to see if I could climb it. My legs burned and my heart pounded as I struggled my way up its steep incline and I wanted to give up and rest partway up the hill but my slightly stubborn side prevailed and the hill was conquered. After that the rest of the ride was leasurely and I was able to enjoy the pretty countryside. One observation though: the highways here in France appear to be very well maintained but the local roads are very narrow and full of pot holes. Despite the less than optimal conditions on the local roads, cars will often travel down them at speeds considered crazy by North American standards and so one has to be very careful when walking or cycling along these country roads.
Bonne nuit de La France.
We’re all somewhat jet lagged so we took things nice and slow today. We enjoyed a nice visit from my aunt Carole and my cousing Sean. My mom, Carole, Liam and Sean went out to do a little grocery shopping while Marissa and I stayed home to let Emma play outside on the playground.
I discovered today, while assembling my bicycle, that my bike seat got bent out of shape sometime during our travels and so tomorrow I will try to acquire a new one. Other than the seat my bike appears to be intact.
Marissa and I drove to the nearby village of Giroussens just after dinner and we enjoyed a nice walk there. Giroussens, located on a hill side above the rivierre L’Agout, has a population of approx. 1000 people and it has been that size for as long as the locals seem to remember. The church in Giroussens dates back to the 14th century and although that isn’t old by European standards, it currently stands as the oldest building that I have ever seen. There aren’t many services in Giroussens but among the ones we found were a boulangerie (bakery), a pharmacy, a post office and a couple of restaurants.
So far so good…tomorrow we’ll venture out further.
Good night from France
It was a very long day of travelling but we are now in our home in Giroussens located about 30 minutes east of Toulouse.
Where to start…ok, overall the day was actually way better than I ever imagined it could be. We begain the day by driving from Canmore to Calgary Airport, a distance of just over 100 KM. After dropping the family off at the airport I drove our vehicle to the nearby storage place where it shall remain until our return at the end of June.
The flight from Calgary to Frankfurt was 9 hours, 30 minutes, and, as mentioned in my earlier post, it was as smooth as such a long flight can be. The kids played for the first four hours and then slept for most of the balance.
Our layover in Frankfurt turned out to be equally painless. Upon arrival we lunched at a McDonalds that we found close to our arrival gate. This McDonalds happened to have a play area so the kids played there for the next 3 hours with a group of other kids from Ireland. I was beginning to feel rather sleepy but at least the kids were happy and occupied so I couldn’t really complain. After play time we went through security and it was boarding time shortly after arriving at our gate. As an aside, Frankfurt airport is absolutely massive and processes over 150,000 people per day throught its terminals. Smokers are allowed to light up in most places and as a result the airport stinks like cigarette smoke worse than even McCarran airport in Las Vegas. Very very nasty.
From Frankfurt airport we boarded a small Lufthansa plane that carried us to our ultimate destination in Toulouse, France. Our luggage (all of it!!!) appeared very quickly and going through customs lasted almost 15 seconds. It was the most painless arrival I’ve ever experienced.
It took two cars and a big truck to carry all of our luggage back to our home-in-France and I’ll let Marissa fill you in on those details. I’ll upload photos of today’s voyage and of our surroundings sometime tomorrow.
Good night from Giroussens, France.
My laptop battery has very little charge left so I’ll make this quick. We’re in Frankfurt airport having just completed the 9.5 hour flight from Calgary. The flight went suprisingly well. The kids were great and they managed to sleep about 4 hours.
We have a 5 hour lay over here in Frankfurt until we catch our flight to Toulouse.
We had a nice drive today from Vernon to Canmore. Sunny weather, good roads, and great scenery, and kids were in a good mood. Here’s a link to a few photos we took today:
Good night from Canmore.
We spent the weekend getting somewhat organized and at this point I think we’re about 90% packed. Between the five of us we currently have 8 pieces of luggage to check in. Due to the mounting costs of this trip we just decided that we’re going to bring along our tent and sleeping bags. We’re hoping that the use of the camping equipment on a few of the excursions away from the home base (near Toulouse) will help keep expenses in check. To date we’ve spent about $16,000 CA and that covers flights, vehicle rental, and our main accommodation. Spread out over 3 months that comes to about $5333 CA per month for the basics, which is not unreasonable for what we are getting, but it is still a lot of money and our bank account will be hurting for a while as a result. I can make myself feel a little bit better by understanding that I’ll be saving money on the following items:
Well, on another note Emma seems quite excited to be going on this adventure, while Liam is a little apprehensive about it. Those reactions are typical and are representative of their personalities: Emma is always ready to jump in while Liam is more cautious at first but then always ends up having a great time. As for me, I’m really starting to dread the long flight. For the last few days I’ve been telling myself that the kids will be ok and that they will sleep on the plane. Then it occured to me today that if they do sleep they will end up being wide awake by the time we arrive in Toulouse and thus that will prevent us (the adults) from being able to sleep and adjust to the local time. So either the flight will be a “challenge” or the first day or two upong arrival will be a “challenge”. Either way, a little wine and some humour will hopefully help us prevail.
We’re all nervous and excited. On March 30th we’re going to drive from Vernon, BC to Canmore, AB. And on the following day we’ll drive from Canmore to Calgary airport where we’ll board a flight that will take us to Frankfurt where, after a 4 hour layover, we will board a flight bound for Toulouse. Keeping Liam and Emma occupied and happy will be our most important and difficult task during the long flight to Frankfurt and during the layover. To make this task as painless as possible, Marissa has asssembled an assortment of toys and books carefully designed to be dispensed at regular intervals to keep the children entertained. I’m somewhat confident that it will work. Yes, of course it will work!!
On March 31st, 2007 my family and I will be travelling to the south of France for a 3-month adventure and we intend to use this blog as a means to document our travels so that our friends and family may follow along with us on our journey.
Stay tuned…
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