Blogs from France, Europe - page 5

The road from Lisieux to Quillebeuf took me through a fertile agricultural landscape where harvesting was well underway. There were several climbs to plateaus where the road continued level before descending, only to soon climb the next plateau. The landscape is not as wild as The Sperrins or Bluestacks. I wonder what the Eatls thought of it. Just before the final descent onto the flood plain of the Seine I stopped by a field of some luxuriant purple flowered crop. I'd no idea what it was, but the butterflies were loving it. I stopped to take a few photos. There were occasional small vernacular houses and barns along the little country road near the river. Long rectangular buildings with thatched roofs topped with a ridge of living turf. No doubt the design has changed little in ... read more

Here is the list, according to Travel Noire: Italy-swarthy types!France-beware the MetroNetherlands-red light district is a problem!Germany-kraut thieves... read more

The run up to this vacation was stressful. Fraught with the habitual tensions of trying to do too much before leaving. The return was even more stressful; full of flight delays and cancellations which had me familiarise myself with Paris Charles de Gaulle more than my own office. I’m not sure that five days away was worth the stress however I will say that Corsica is the beauty that I thought it would be. So close geographically to Sardinia; its beauty is truly in its azure blue water beaches, rugged landscapes and peaceful atmosphere. The interior of Corsica c’est sauvage, c’est beau. My linguistic fluency came into its own and I made friends from mainland France too. Of course any notion of my gluten-free, sugar-free, un-caffeinated diet went astray with my daily dose of several freshly ... read more

Taking a break from talking about what I've seen and done to what I've eaten. With great cheeses and bread, how can you go wrong? Best meal so far...Pain Vin Fromage...a fondue restaurant in the Marias neighborhood : a beautiful cellar like setting with 2 different fondues, bread and potatoes...it was delicious and Kir Royal to wash it down. It was an adventure getting there with clogged roads that caused our Uber driver to tell us to get out and walk, while the others were traveling without wifi to get there. Fortunately the restaurant seated us even though we were an hour late and the meal was totally worth it. Tea in Cafe Lavierve was pretty yummy too. It was in an article in the New York Times '36 Hours in Paris' so Roberta wanted to ... read more

OK, All those who bet I couldn't go a day without a blog update - You win! Today wasn't meant to be about sight seeing, it was about resting our legs and checking the bikes over, going to a local bike shop and for Jeff to get a SIM card. After breakfast Jeff looked up a bike shop and we headed off. Interestingly enough it was were the Velodrome was from last night. On arriving we found that Jeff had looked up the administrative offices of Roubaix Cycling. We went in for a look anyway and were blown away. The front office was packed with artefacts and photos from Paris-Roubaix races across the decades. It had souvenirs for sale AND served coffee. We spent some time looking around the place, they were happy to accommodate us ... read more