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Monday, June 24, 2013

On the road again

As soon as I got done with work on Friday we jumped in the car and drove the 350 kilometers to Angers where we spent the weekend visiting with my good friend Julie and celebrating her 30th birthday.  Julie just happens to be my only real female French friend and we met in Paris when she was one of my English students.  She has since quit her job in Paris and moved back to Angers where she is doing a formation to change careers so I didn't get to see her much before our move to the States and it was un vrai plaisir to get to spend the weekend with her.

Unfortunatley the weather wasn't willing to cooperate with our plan to celebrate her birthday with a barbeque out at her friends' house à la campagne between Angers and Nantes, but we tried to make the best of this horrible start to summer nonetheless.  We got in kinda late Friday night, but still headed into the center to enjoy what little we could of La fête de la musique.

view of some of the old houses in Angers while out in the center for La fête de la musique

Saturday we walked around the city and explored before heading to the store to pick up some food and drink for a Saturday evening birthday meal à la bonne franquette.  Then we were off into the country to spend the evening at her friends' house out in the middle of nowhere.  We had a great night despite the miserable weather and her friends' home is this beautiful old country house that they can trace back to the French Revolution.  Needless to say, they are en plein travaux, with far more work to do than we have, but it was very nice of them to let us stay there.  I wish I had taken some pictures of the house, but unfortunately I didn't think of it at the time.

 Chateau d'Angers

the Chateau d'Angers

the Chateau d'Angers

 Julie and I

 the Cathedrale d'Angers

 view over Angers

 le centre historique d'Angers

Originally on Sunday we had been hoping to explore the area a little more and maybe visit Saumur and the Abbaye de Fontevraud, but the weather was so bad we decided to just hang out with everyone for a while and then get on the road relatively early.  All in all it was a great weekend, but I am more than ready for summer to come to France!

4 comments:

  1. Serious lover of your blog, a considerable number of your blog posts have really helped me out. Looking towards updates!

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    1. Thanks for reading! I'm glad you enjoy it and find it helpful!

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  2. I've never been to Nantes or Angers. I would have to say that the north-west of France is the area I know the least.

    Don't worry, I only have one real French friend as well. And she lives across the country in Grenoble.

    I went away with my husband for our first romantic weekend away in ages (we travel a lot, but most of our travel is for my husband's work). Guess what? It rained almost the entire time. I don't know what happening with Europe this year! Everybody should just come to Denmark - it hasn't been all that bad here. I should just take my own advice and vacation here.

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    1. Yeah, the weather has been absolutely dreadful this year. But then, I feel like I've been hearing the same thing for years now in France..."oh, it's just a bad year" or "this year is colder/rainier/snowier than the usual", etc. The last time I remember having experienced a nice spring and summer in France was 2004 when I was here studying for a few months as an undergrad. I'm beginning to think that the climate is just changing for the worse!

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