We had breakfast in a room of the country homestead with three other guests and the large cheery red faced woman who rant eh B and B and her boisterous toddler. It was typically French - Croissants, baguettes, team and Jus de Pomme (apple juice) and Pear juice from the property. It was all a really fantastic experience and it cost only 40 euro for both of us which Blandines parents had very kindly paid for. Our first stop that morning was Mont St. Michele which is a massive chapel and fortified village built on a rock just off the French coast in 9
66. There were over 300 stairs to get to the top of the Chapel (which cost 5 euro to enter and included a guided tour) and once there offered amazing views of the French coast line. Our French guide spoke very good English and made the tour quite interesting telling our small group many valuable things about he monks that use to live there. On the way back down to the car we took the busy street that we and deliberately bypassed on the way up and I bought some nice tinned biscuits for Blandines parents as a thank you gift as Blandine said that they were a family favourite.We then drove out of the Normandy district and entered Brittany (home of the British who used to be separate from France) and had a very British Dijon (lunch) –crepes! I had a mix of ham, potato and cheese for the main and then chocolate, cream, banana and ice cream for the dessert – it must have been one of the nicest lunches that I had in Europe.Our next port of call was Saint Malo, a fortified village on the coast. Along thw way we drove right next to the rugged coast line, saw some sail carts on the beach an Blandine very patiently answered all of my niggling question about France and the French language such as ‘If a cars engine is female and a ships anchor is male what would the gender be if I tied a chain to an engine and threw it off the side of a boat and used it as an anchor?’ Surprisingly the answer wasn’t ‘shut up Justin you’re being a twat’ but ‘male’. The French are crazy with their genders – everything is either male or female, there was nothing that I could name that didn’t have a gender and no way of rigging the system either.It was five o’clock when we arrived at St. Malo and we walked along the sea side walk way to the city centre. It was here that the fortifications were built and inside were lovely kissing streets with cobble stone bases. They were named this because they are so narrow that people in buildings on either side of the street could lean out of their windows and kiss in the middle. We walked through the streets, listened to buskers and ate salty butter caramel ice-cream before driving to Blandines country house – which we had dubbed the country Chateau. It was about 23:30 when we arrived (the French generally use twenty four hour time) and I got stuck into the local chunky pig insides pâté, chicken and baguette followed up with home grown nuts, strawberries and home made chocolate mouse, while Blandine talked to her boyfriend Theabeau (Teebow) on the phone. We slept in an old barn that had been converted into very nice living quarters. There were shutters on the windows of my room which made it very dark ad as a result we both slept in quite lat the following day. I slept fantastically but again had an unsettling dream…
66. There were over 300 stairs to get to the top of the Chapel (which cost 5 euro to enter and included a guided tour) and once there offered amazing views of the French coast line. Our French guide spoke very good English and made the tour quite interesting telling our small group many valuable things about he monks that use to live there. On the way back down to the car we took the busy street that we and deliberately bypassed on the way up and I bought some nice tinned biscuits for Blandines parents as a thank you gift as Blandine said that they were a family favourite.We then drove out of the Normandy district and entered Brittany (home of the British who used to be separate from France) and had a very British Dijon (lunch) –crepes! I had a mix of ham, potato and cheese for the main and then chocolate, cream, banana and ice cream for the dessert – it must have been one of the nicest lunches that I had in Europe.Our next port of call was Saint Malo, a fortified village on the coast. Along thw way we drove right next to the rugged coast line, saw some sail carts on the beach an Blandine very patiently answered all of my niggling question about France and the French language such as ‘If a cars engine is female and a ships anchor is male what would the gender be if I tied a chain to an engine and threw it off the side of a boat and used it as an anchor?’ Surprisingly the answer wasn’t ‘shut up Justin you’re being a twat’ but ‘male’. The French are crazy with their genders – everything is either male or female, there was nothing that I could name that didn’t have a gender and no way of rigging the system either.It was five o’clock when we arrived at St. Malo and we walked along the sea side walk way to the city centre. It was here that the fortifications were built and inside were lovely kissing streets with cobble stone bases. They were named this because they are so narrow that people in buildings on either side of the street could lean out of their windows and kiss in the middle. We walked through the streets, listened to buskers and ate salty butter caramel ice-cream before driving to Blandines country house – which we had dubbed the country Chateau. It was about 23:30 when we arrived (the French generally use twenty four hour time) and I got stuck into the local chunky pig insides pâté, chicken and baguette followed up with home grown nuts, strawberries and home made chocolate mouse, while Blandine talked to her boyfriend Theabeau (Teebow) on the phone. We slept in an old barn that had been converted into very nice living quarters. There were shutters on the windows of my room which made it very dark ad as a result we both slept in quite lat the following day. I slept fantastically but again had an unsettling dream…
No comments:
Post a Comment