The Olympic Cauldron

 Many people visit Paris in August, but mostly they run into other tourists. This year, there seem to be fewer tourists throughout the city and more centered around the Olympic Games. It's nice to hear French voices as we visit Paris, rather than lots of American accents.

As we walked from Gare de Lyon toward our hotel in the Latin Quarter, we sat down at a restaurant near Rue Mouffetarde and had a charcuterie plate. More than half of the tables were empty on a sunny Sunday afternoon. 

The only time we found crowds was when we ventured to Les Jardin des Tuileries, the gardens just past the Louvre. The reason I wanted to come to Paris, was to see the Olympic cauldron, that hot air balloon that lifts into the sky at sunset. I wasn't alone. Many people gathered to see that rising up. 

As we waited for the sun to set

The risen cauldron with the Eiffel Tower in t he distance

We waited by a fenced off area to see it rise. Earl, being taller, took a video of it. 

As we traversed the city at night, it reminded me of our first visits to Paris when we would see the Eiffel Tower around odd buildings. It seemed to appear everywhere. The same was true of the Olympic cauldron.

As we left, we turned and saw it above the trees. 

Us and everyone else in Paris

We walked down a road to retrieve the sweater I had left at dinner, then crossed the Pont Neuf and once again, we saw the Olympic cauldron shimmering above the renaissance palaces along the Seine. 

The castles look like they're made from Legos

According to an NPR article, the mayor of Paris Anne Hidalgo is considering making  it a full-time monument in Paris. The article is a bit confusing because it says 10,000 people get free tickets to watch the cauldron rise each night, but there were no tickets involved. People just pushed their way up to the fences and waited for sunset so they could see the cauldron rise. 

I wanted a picture of the balloon through the Arc de Triomphe du Carrousel, but there were too many people around in the evening.

You can see all the people trying to get pictures

I vowed to return on a run early in the morning and catch the Hot Air Balloon without the crowds. 

I did. 

Part of one lone bicyclist interrupted my picture on Monday morning.

I also got a peek of the sun rising behind Notre Dame (still under reconstruction) 

Another bicyclist, they were everywhere

And a shot of the sun rising nearly at the top of the Louvre pyramid. If I had changed directions a bit, I might have got it perfectly, but being on a run, I didn't have too long to slow down, plus I couldn't really see the picture with the sun blaring in my eyes. 

Here comes the sun

This short Paris jaunt was well worth the trip. 

A Last Minute Dash to Paris

Nothing says it’s time to blog again like a last-minute trip to Paris. 

We planned to avoid Paris like the plaque this year with the Olympics taking place. Until a blogging friend arrived in a Paris and said she was surprised by the “emptiness.” 

Suddenly, my heart beat a little faster! 

I had watched the opening ceremonies and parcoured along with the Phantom who jumped from rooftop to rooftop. When the flame lit the cauldron and the “hot air balloon” rose above Les Tuileries, I longed to see it. 

Earl had appointments scheduled for Monday and Tuesday, but it didn’t take much persuading to get him to reschedule. 

We purchased train tickets from Perpignan in the south of France to Paris. And after a gathering with friends Saturday night, we drove to Perpignan as the sun rose pink over the foothills of the Pyrenees. 

Earl and I had bought our tickets individually, with our senior advantage card for people 60 and over. His seat was in coach 3 and mine was in coach 13. We wandered through the train station looking for someone who could help us arrange seats together but the office was closed early on a Sunday morning. 

We settled for coffee and a croissant, plus a chocolatine for me, which apparently they call pain au chocolat in Perpignan, like the rest of France. 

As we took the escalator up to Voie E to board our train, a conductor stood waiting to see our tickets. I described our dilemma about the seats. 

She asked “do you want to be with me?” Pointing to the coach that Earl was seated in. 

“Bien sur!” I said. And she checked the schedule before telling us which seats were available for us to sit together. 

The TGV is fairly empty now, but we have several stops before Paris. 

As we roll along toward Paris, I looked out the window and to my delight, saw the Mediterranean! 

Next as we passed some salt flats, I saw flamingos feeding peacefully. This already feels like a magical trip. 

Cockadoodle Doo or Cocorico?

 We stood in the middle of the road, having walked together 13 miles that day and Claudine grasped my forearm.

"Mais non! It doesn't make sense. It doesn't sound like that at all!" she insisted. 

This passionate response from my French friend came after she asked me what we say in America for the sound a rooster makes. 

Maybe I didn't sell it to her, I think, and I make a crowing sound like "Cock a doodle doo!"

"Non, it's cocorico. It sounds just like a rooster!" she insisted. 

"It sounds like a drink," I insisted. "I'll have a cocorico in Puerto rico."

We were both bent over laughing as we continued walking down the road, the sun shining on us after walking five and a half hours so far. We had started that morning in Figeac, France, in the Lot region. We'd left behind the more extreme mountain climbs in the Aude for rolling hills and homes built of bleached stone with carefully sculpted roof tiles. We planned to walk four days along one of the many trails that lead to El Camino de Santiago in Spain. In France, the routes are called Chemin de Saint Jacque de Compostelle 

On Tuesday we dropped the car in St. Cirq la Popie, our ending point, and we took the bus back to Figeac. We found a restaurant in Figeac, eating dinner at 8 p.m. When we opened the menu, we nearly fainted at the perfection. I had told Claudine on the bus that I hadn't eaten foie gras or duck since I'd been back in France. Then we searched for a restaurant that served foie gras. We ended up at La Puce a l'Oreille in Figeac. Starting with foie gras then moving on to magret de canard (duck). 

"If we eat foie gras for dinner every night, we'll gain many kilos before we get home," Claudine pointed out before taking a bite of the starter and pausing for the sheer pleasure of it in her mouth. 

If ever there was a meal fit for the word sublime, this was it.  The setting, the service, the food. Surely we were ready for our hike the next day. 

The jovial host at the B&B saw us off after coffee and croissants. We stopped at a bakery for a baquette sandwich -- jambon sec, butter and lettuce. The bakery server cut the sandwich in two so we could share it later. And, voila, we were off. The trail would be 21 kilometers from the Figeac to Corn. 

Corn is a strange name for a town, but in France, they don't call corn corn. They call it maïs with two syllables. A fairly steep climb took us out of Figeac, but the entire hike, 15 miles, we only climbed about 1400 feet, which we struggle up in 45 minutes leaving our town.

Hiking long distances in France is very different from the United States. We don't carry tents and sleeping bags. We don't pack our bags with beans and rice to eat over a fire. We walk from town to town and sleep in a gites or B and B. We have dinner in a restaurant or at the host's table. 

After a few hours of hiking, we ventured through the village Faycelles and stopped to take pictures of the irises lining stone steps. At the top, we stopped for coffee and a panoramic view of the valley and river below. 

Two hours later in Beduer, we walked into town to find that the only store near the trail had closed at 12:30. We couldn't buy drinks for lunch, but we had our water and our sandwich. Claudine had brought along two pain au chocolat from the day before, so we had those for dessert as we sat at a concrete table by the cathedral with a view of a nearby chateau. We chatted with hikers from Canada, from Nantes and Orleans France. Most of the hikers on this trail are from France. 

During our six hour hike, Claudine had declared it "French speaking only" so that I could practice my French. Walking and following trail markers and trying to speak only French, it was a challenge. But by the end of the day, I wondered if I'd be able to speak English when I called Earl later. 

We walked a few kilometers outside of Corn to our BnB, thinking we would never get there. Stopping to take pictures of a field of poppies. A climb up to the BnB and we were greeted by a giant white Great Pyrenees dog with deep woofs.

Finally, after 15 miles, 22 kilometers, we could take our shoes off our tired feet. Rinse the salt of sweat from our bodies and enjoy another great meal, this time of cucumber in creme fraiche for starters then couscous with lamb and carrots followed by gelato. 

Weather and Marriage

 This morning I jauntily set off on my run. The weather app showed cloudy skies and nothing to worry about until high winds around 1 p.m. The temperature was 7 C, that's about 44 Fahrenheit. As I ran my 5K, I stopped and shot a picture of a rainbow. What luck!

When I turned back toward home, the rainbow wasn't visible and the wind began to pick up. Soon the rain joined it. A light misting at first, then it began to pour in earnest. I usually finish my runs with a walk to stretch, but the dire weather convinced me to keep running until the end as hail began to pelt the bill of my Nike cap. 

I made it inside the kitchen, soaked and shivering. 

"Well that was unexpected," I called to Earl as I walked in the house. 

He came to the kitchen and held up my bath towel. "Need this?"

I pulled off my hat and my jacket, handing them to him. I untied my soaked shoes and peeled off my socks so I wouldn't leave wet footprints on the tile floor. 

"Is that it?" Earl asked, gesturing to my shirt and my pants.

"Yeah, I'll hang my pants on the radiator upstairs," I told him. 

He turned to strategically place my wet clothes on the radiator in the kitchen. 

"No show today, folks!" he said to himself.

"You've seen this show plenty of times," I reminded him. 

"Yeah, but it never gets old. That's why I bought season tickets."

Guess I'm pretty lucky after 32 years of marriage. 

The Opposite of Sun Worship

 It gets hot in the south of France. Summer days can soar into the 90s or even 100 Fahrenheit; that's in the 30s Celsius. 

And like most people in France, we don't have air conditioning. We get only a few moments of smugness as we consider that we aren't harming the environment, before the sweat wipes away that do-gooding feeling. 

So how do we stay cool in the summer? It's about 75 degrees Fahrenheit (23 C) inside our thick- walled house, but that's only because we have learned how to keep it cool. 

Usually, we throw open the shutters on our windows in the morning to embrace the sun, 

The sun peaks over the mountains in the morning.

but in summer, I prop the wooden shutters open like a tent rather than opening them fully. 

The muted light filters in and the air can circulate

Sometimes I close the windows as well. At night, I do the opposite, I throw the shutters open, allowing the light from nearby street lights to fill the bedroom as the cool air filters through our lace curtains. 

The sun peeping through the guest bedroom window

The most important thing is to protect the indoors from the strong sunshine. We also keep the fans running -- overhead fans in the bedrooms and office. Standing floor fans in the downstairs rooms. 

Even with our shutter method, the upstairs is decidedly warmer than the downstairs by evening, but once the sun goes down, the shutters are opened and I place a fan in front of the window to suck in the cooler air. 

At night, the temperature has been dropping down to 16 or 17 Celsius, in the 60s Fahrenheit. That gives the house a chance to cool off before the next day's heat assault. 

Once you get used to it, it doesn't seem so hard to live without air conditioning. After all, we've already adapted to only run the dishwasher and the washing machine at night when the electricity prices are lower. 

A Moment in Time

For the past six months, I’ve taken a picture on the last day of each month of the bridge and river on my way home from a walk or run. 

Sunny January but the trees that aren't conifers are bare

February things began to sprout

March and the mountains start to look green

April going out like a lion with rain

In May the river was lined with flowers

This is a sad June picture, overcast and the water severely down,
 but some rain is predicted this week

This last picture is the view from the bridge, back toward where I usually shoot the picture. The road isn't really visible, but you can see the cemetery that borders the road. 

On July 2, I was walking across the bridge and caught this fisherman in action. 

I won't get to take pictures on the last day of the month for the next few months. We're headed back to the States to spend some time with Mom and Dad. Dad is freshly out of the hospital and we have no reason not to go help out, except that we may miss some parties, and even I'm not that selfish. 

Hopefully, we'll get to enjoy the summer fêtes in France next year. 

This year though, we'll get to enjoy August in Florida. 

French Bread Secrets

It’s true that many places in France have baguette vending machines. Baguettes are iconic in France, and a meal isn’t a meal without bread. 

The vital vending machine

This morning, after an hour-long hike before the temperatures rise too high, I stopped at the bakery and saw a woman filling the baguette machine. 

I knew I needed to peek inside to learn the secrets of the baguette vending machine and share it too. 

The young woman politely stepped back and let me snap a picture while juggling the bread and pastries I had already purchased. 

Et voilà! 

The inner workings

Baguettes lined up in a row waiting for customers to put their 1,20 in and have a baguette slide into their hands.