A very social time…. with much walking and talking…
The picture is from last night’s dinner at chez nous (our apartment!) - with Maree and Karen, Julie Bladon and Mim from Brisbane. And the garden is at Giverney, Monet’s home.
Maree Eastgate and Karen Lynch have come and gone - and we seem to have ‘done’ Paris in just a few days. Firstly we flew to Nice to see Jonathon Lynch who is crewing on one of these amazing boats - 160 feet long and crew of 12; Explored Nice - and I had forgotten that the beach there is all pebbles - with people lying on their towels sunbaking!!! . Highlights were walking through the old city, dinner with Jonathon and Robbie Fisher (our boys all went to school together) which was very hilarious and cost us a huge amount for the Rose wine they all drank!!! Then caught the train to Monaco where we were shown over the very beautiful and luxurious boat, a walk around the Casino, and a tour of the palace. Then a bus to a small village, set high about the sea called Eze, very picturesque with small alley ways and lanes.
Getting back to Nice involved waiting for a bus, eventually getting to the Monaco station. Tried to buy our tickets on the automatic machine - maree was certain she could manage this - in French. 15 minutes later, with the queue behind her getting longer, she put in all her coins, only to have the machine gobble up the coins with no tickets. Consternation, I was already in the queue for the booking office (I had foreshadowed this event), told the ticket man about our lost money (a whole E9 - about 13 dollars), who immediately sent a lady to open up the machine, explaining that it actually didn’t take coins at all, only notes!!! But she very kindly, and very slowly opened up the machine and even more slowly fished out our coins - meanwhile our train was leaving….. we ran for the train, maree racing down the wrong escalator, turned halfway down and ran back up while we are falling about laughing as we watched our train glide out of the station!!! Of course the irony was that there was another train 5 minutes later!!! Maree’s only comment was that she had chipped her toenail whilst running up the down escalator - it was a very funny end to our day.
Back in Paris and with much red wine and more talking, we planned out their 5 days - I think we walked at least 10 kms every day. Ste Chapelle took their breath away, Notre Dame is of course quite awesome and we found some
great little shops in the Ile St Louis.
Had lunch in the beautiful dome of Printemps, admired the dome at Galleries Lafayette, walked in the rain to the Louvre, plus the usual Eiffel tower etc. etc. some shopping in between and altogether such a fun time.
Julie Bladon and Mim have arrived and will stay in our apartment whilst we go to Scandinavia - Julie has already made a good start on the shops in Passy - and she’s only been here 2 hours!! We are off to Scandinavia, so hopefully next blog from the fjords of Norway - or somewhere!!! Our trip includes a boat trip from Copenhagen to Oslo and then a train out to Ballestrand and Bergen
Hope you all keeping warm in Melbourne - and getting lots of rain.
Au revoir Barb
