The staycation is over!

We had a lazy few days after my return, partly due to all the transportation strikes and gas shortages. We saw Christophe Maé in Paris on the 20th. He was great! Apart from that, we ventured out a few times (to go to the gym and see a couple English movies at the cinema – The Social Network and Wall Street 2). Other than that, I spent 70% of my waking hours in my bathrobe, eating Leonidas and catching up on American tv. (It didn’t make for an inspiring blog post). These might be my last weeks of unemployment (more to come soon!) so one must take advantage.

We managed to fill the car up and decided to take a trip to The Loire to drink some wine and see some chateaux. It was an ambitious 2 days, but was a great getaway. The Loire is beautiful, especially this time of year. And there are a TON of chateaux (more than 300) out there. This is why. There is such a thing as too many chateaux in two days, so we only checked out a few.

The Chateau de Chenonceau (Henry II) was really cool, especially seeing how it was built over the river, that every room was filled with fresh flowers (and an appropriate nod to Halloween with a pumpkin/gourd display) AND that you got to check out the large kitchens in the basement of the castle.

After noticing we only had half a tank of gas left and that almost every gas station we passed was closed due to being out of fuel, we found a station and waited 45 min to fill – a maximum of €30/car, lest we run out while trying to get home. According to the newspaper I read this morning, only a dozen or so out of 126 stations in the Loire had gas yesterday.

We decided to spend the night in Le Chateau de Sept Tours, just outside of Tours.

This is Francois I’s “weekend” (and hunting) palace, Chambord.

Another highlight in the Loire was the excellent white wine from Amboise and Vouvray. I loved being able to walk into a winery and sample everything. Our suitcase came back quite a bit heavier.

Back in Cheeseland

I’m back at (my French) home after a great trip with A. We spent a great week in Spain (Barcelona, Valencia, Alicante) and an even better weekend in London.

We enjoyed biking around Barcelona by night, eating countless plates of calamari and patatas bravas, visiting the Modernist sights (park Guell, my favourite!), trying not to butcher the Spanish language while speaking with anyone who would listen, ambling around the Boqueria market, spending 6 hours in a pintxo bar in Alicante, drinking many a pitcher of sangria, spending a beautiful day at the beach and not getting robbed.

London, was in top form as usual. Delicious food (Jamie Oliver...you can do no wrong), amazing shopping, and entertaining shows (Tribes and Jersey Boys). I also enjoyed not getting hit by cabs whilst crossing the road (looking the wrong way) and Pret a Manger lunches.

France greeted me with strikes. The trains are on strike. Oil refineries are on strike (no gas!). Air traffic controllers are on strike. It seems as though we will not be able to get anywhere by train, car or plane. Should be an interesting week!

We're off!

Hello
No Nuit Blanche post...I had one drafted but A is here and we've been very busy - I haven't gotten around to it.
All is well here and we spent a good day in Paris...despite me being quite unnerved about all the threats and travel advisories for France. It's quite unsettling. The police were out en masse today. Regardless, we had an enjoyable day and a fantastic wine tasting class at O Chateau. It was really fun and I learned more in an hour than I have in two months living in France. They served baguette alongside the wine. The same bread the president gets...it was really good.
I'm off to Spain for a week! There probably won't be any posts until I get back.
Take care!
Jen

Le marché aux puces

Well, les marchés aux puces because I went to two. I headed into Paris on my own early yesterday morning to check out the flea market at Vanves. I downloaded Keys to the Fleas on my iphone and set out to find some deals. Why Vanves?


The market was really interesting and its small size made for an enjoyable and not overwhelming experience. What was there? Doll heads, obviously. These seem to be a flea market staple. Why? Who’s buying them? There were dozens of stalls selling vintage keys, prints, postcards, clothing, buttons, jewelry, plates, mirrors and more. I ended up buying a black necklace and a brooch.

Since the market ended earlier than anticipated (it started raining), I had 7 hours to kill before meeting N for dinner. I decided to head to Clignancourt, the granddaddy of all French flea markets, on the other side of Paris. Clignancourt has several submarkets (each having 80 or so stalls) so one could easily spend a whole day wandering from market to market. However, one should probably have a job, unlike yours truly (for the moment anyway) because this market was significantly pricier than Vanves. I spotted some beautiful jewlery (yay) but it turned out to be Chanel (which should be a yay, but is an jobless boo). I would have also happily walked away with a vintage LV trunk, but that might not be the wisest investment vehicle at this point in time...

I walked away empty handed but I do plan on returning to Vanves. Apparently I need a cake stand and mismatched cups and saucers. Really.

I refuelled with a frappuccino (Parisian Starbucks is making a killing off of me) and strolled around the St Germain and then up les Champs Elysées to meet N. My feet felt like they were going to fall off - I'm actually glad I didn't buy much (N probably is too!). But my day wasn’t over, by 6pm we had another 7 hours to go. Yesterday was Nuit Blanche in Paris. More to come ...