More from Bonnieux

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Bonnieux to Chamonix
After taking a day off from driving, (Wednesday, May 16) on Thursday, we headed toward the Camargue and Ste. Marie de la Mer. The town itself was VERY tourist oriented—more or less a summer trailer park—but the surrounding area was interesting and pretty. We could have taken another tour of a bird sanctuary at probably about $50 for the both of us, but we opted instead just to look around on our own. Aside from a number of sea birds that we had already seen and learned about from our travels in the northern part of France, the birds I was most interested in seeing were the pink flamingos. And sure enough, we saw lots of them!

That night, we decided to go to a real French restaurant for supper. We dressed up (a bit) and made reservations. Kevin had a potato entrée and I had escargots. For the main dish, he had fish and I had lamb. Anyone in Canada is sure to have seen the commercial “Three string beans and some drizzle”—well, that’s just about what we had. I noticed that most of the women in the restaurant were feeding their partners bits of their own supper. Probably just like me, they were the ones who wanted to try out the French dining experience and dragged their husbands along. Actually the food was very good and beautifully presented and believe it or not, I felt full enough. Maybe I’ll start preparing food the French way (a tablespoon of barley, two of veggies, and two weensy lamb chops). While we were in the restaurant, the “mistrals” were blowing and we thought perhaps the windows would blow in on us.

We went to the Bonnieux market the next morning (Friday). Apparently it was smaller than usual because some of the vendors didn’t want their wares to be blown away. It wasn’t windy, though. I think that being here in May is great, especially because there are lots of flowers in bloom; however, later in the season, the lavender is blooming, and that must be wonderful to see.

The rest of the day was spent getting ready for our departure on Saturday. In fact, we were supposed to be leaving on Sunday, but we decided to go to Chamonix in the Alps as a stopping off point instead of trying to race all the way to Zurich in one day.

We were invited by the Canadians who had our “gite” before us over for an afternoon glass of wine. They had to move out because we had reserved the space. They’re a young couple with two kids, 14 and 8, who are on a sabbatical traveling around Europe. It was really refreshing to speak English to other Canadians and compare adventures. Both Kathy and I are the navigators, and we’ve both gotten pretty lost in some of the areas.
The kids have been home-schooled for their travels and Kathy says that it’s quite the experience to help her daughter who’s in grade 8 with her math in French (been there—done that!)

They went to Italy before France and really enjoyed it. Maybe we’ll follow their footsteps in another vacation. They were heading for Spain after Bonnieux while we were heading north.

While Kevin had a nap, I walked around Bonnieux and took dozens of pictures of flowers, etc. I've included a few. One of them accidentally got published twice, but I can't remove it. Sorry.

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Photos

Horses and Flamingos
The Camargue is known for its pink flamingos, white horses, and black bulls.