Canoeing and Tipping in the Aude

 Monday, we finally made it on a long awaited canoe trip. We have changed the date three times because of bad weather. 

Old bridge supports framed our back and forth movements down the river. 

We went with our friends Ray and Claudine who are into more extreme sports than we are, but they assured us this was a level 1 canoeing trip, just a calm ride down the Aude river in the south of France. 

Earl and I have limited canoeing skills. We haven't gone canoeing very often, and certainly not in areas with rapids. We have been kayaking on a canal in the past few years and of course we floated on rafts down a river in Massachusetts several times, but that did not prepare us for the canoe trip. 

The biggest problem was mostly the yelling between the two of us. That and getting stuck on rocks and having to get out on slippery rocks where the water is running fast to budge the canoe off the rocks. And one time, we did turn over completely with Earl going under the water because it was deep there. 

Tipping over

Although it looks like I'm leaning on the canoe to keep Earl from emerging, I wasn't.

The circus-type atmosphere did not prevent us from enjoying the beauty during the calm parts of the river. At one point we saw two blue herons take flight and crisscross above the river like a beautiful dance. 

Ray and Claudine would stop and wait for us. That's how they took so many pictures.

The water was low, so that might have been part of the problem as we got stuck on rocks. Earl and I were just too heavy and weighed down the canoe rather than skimming over the rocks. Surprisingly, there were a lot of important decisions to make as we paddled along the canoe, watching Ray and Claudine go before us. If they had a hard time or got stuck, we would try another route , but it wasn't usually better than the route they had taken. 

Ray and Claudine were much more in sync than we were. 

At one place, we pulled the canoes up on some rocks and looked at caves. My phone was tucked away in the waterproof container that stores important things on the back of the canoe, so I don't have pictures. But Claudine did take this picture of us before we climbed back in the canoe. 

 It wasn't far from the caves to the end, so it should have all gone splendidly, but as Earl got in the canoe, I pushed it off the rocks and hopped in, I felt a pain in the back of my thigh just below my swimsuit. Had I sat on a burr from the hillside? Nope, a bee sting. What are the odds that I would sit on a bee in a canoe. Very rare. Luckily, the cold water helped ease the pain of the sting and I'm not allergic.

We provided our friends with a lot of laughs as we meandered down the river, getting stuck, turning over, getting stuck again, going down some whitewater backward at one point. But we agreed that we would try it again in the future when the water level got a bit higher. 

After canoeing, we stopped at a friend's restaurant in Couiza. Andy is an English chef who has worked on Russian yachts among other places. Last year he started a restaurant right before Covid hit. We had been there once before for English roast, which is a Sunday thing with meat and Yorkshire pudding and lots of roasted vegetables. But we aren't English so it was hard to judge. 

Monday's meal assured us that dining at Andy's restaurant À Table, which means "to the table" or "come to the table" in French, is a great experience. It started with some amuse bouches, baba ganouches (like a humus from eggplant) and little potatoes with spices and a mayonnaise-type sauce to dip them in. We ordered the 19.95 Euro menu which included a starter, a main course and a dessert. But before the starter, first there was another amuse bouche of gazpacho.  

We weren't sure, so asked the server and she said we were supposed to drink it.
It had a kick to it with garlic, pepper and paprika added. 

For my starter, I had a poached egg served over spinach and a basket made of parmesan cheese.

The main dish for me was lamb plus gratin potatoes. I paid a 6 euro supplement for the lamb. 

And for dessert, a sticky toffee pudding with a side of ice cream. I hadn't eaten
sticky toffee pudding before going to Andy's restaurant, so I can't compare it, but
the first few bites taste like delicious brown sugar and butter. 

 
We left Andy's restaurant very full but delighting in the delicious meal. 

We might not be able to canoe very well, but we can eat a nice French lunch and return home for a nap with the best of them. 

More Covid Adventures

On a 10-degree day (50 Fahrenheit) soaking our feet in thermal waters

 It seems silly, the things that we miss during lockdown. I have friends who have lost their mothers and fathers. Who am I to whine about missing restaurants, bars and cafes? Getting together with friends, stopping for coffee at the end of a walk or meeting for a glass of wine at the bar overlooking the river. 

But that is one thing we've missed. Restaurants and bars have been closed in France since October 30th.

Rain was predicted in Quillan for Monday. We had talked about revisiting the beach from the previous week, since our friend Kris had been working rather than joining us. But high winds were predicted along the Mediterranean all week. We started looking at maps and when we heard about a restaurant that served food at outside picnic tables, we agreed to go, thinking it might feel like eating at a restaurant again.

The restaurant though was at the top of a Col, though, a mountain pass. The weather forecast said sun, but the high temperature predicted was 1 Celsius, 33 Fahrenheit. 

We drove through curving roads, moving higher and higher, expecting to see snow, but much of the snow has melted. Along the way, Kris named a litany of foods he planned to order once we got to the restaurant. "Steak haché and frites, moules, a demi of rouge, and that's just for starters."

When we rounded a corner, we saw a fabulous view of the Pyrénées and the snow we had anticipated. 

In spite of warm weather, the high peaks retain their snow.

The place looked deserted. We were the only car in the lot. We walked around enjoying the view but shivered in the cold. The time had arrived for us to see whether the restaurant was open. 

We walked in, masks in place, and acted like people who hadn't been at a restaurant for five months. The proprietor asked if she could help us and I stumbled over words like "repas" and "dejeuner." Finally, she understood we were there for food and she cautioned that we needed to eat at the tables outside. We agreed and eagerly ordered. Tartiflette for me, potatoes with cheese and ham, a delicious mountain meal. Earl, Kris and Derrick all ordered hamburgers with special sauce and fries. Derrick drank mulled wine while the rest of us had red wine. 

The view from the picnic tables is lovely, but chilly. 

Me and Earl

After our lunch, finished with a coffee and a toilet break (always a worry for me because many toilets are closed due to Covid), we drove across the col to the town of Ax-les-Thermes. We've heard that cities with Ax and Aix were hubs for Romans, like Aix en Provence, but I can't confirm that from my curosry search online. The Romans were there in Ax-les-Thermes, enjoying the thermal waters back in the day. And Ax is related to the Latin word for water.

Nevertheless, the town is now know for its waters and for its skiing. France has banned skiing for the year because of the virus. French people who try to go to nearby countries (Spain, Andorra, Italy) are not allowed to ski either. 

There are hot water fountains in two places in town. 

The temperature warmed up quite a bit from the restaurant to Ax-les-Thermes, registering at about 10 Celsius or 50 Fahrenheit. We quickly pulled off our boots and socks to soak our feet in the warm water. 

Good thing I had a pedicure for my birthday

Kris and Earl enjoy the hottest water

  The water is generally hotter closer to the source it comes out, but it wasn't too hot on the day we were there. 
After some time in the water, which left our feet feeling very soft, we drove up to the ski station. The snow machines are not making snow. Only patches are left. Kids and parents pull up sleds and come down the hills. 

A lonely ski slope

I had packed some hot chocolate with amaretto in a thermos, so we enjoyed it while Kris and Derrick's dogs played in the snow. I even brought along a can of whipped cream, which the Brits call "squirty cream." 

A cup of hot chocolate in the snow and sunshine. 

It was a pretty great adventure. 

Another Potential Home

Thank you for joining this weekly meme. Grab a copy of the photo above and link back to An Accidental Blog. Share with the rest of us your passion for France. Did you read a good book set in France? See a movie? Take a photo in France? Have an adventure? Eat a fabulous meal or even just a pastry? Or if you're in France now, go ahead and lord it over the rest of us. We can take it.

We were afraid, as we visited charming city after charming city, that we were being seduced with the beautiful, sunny weather. Maybe the towns weren't as fabulous as we thought.
So on a cloudy day, we pulled into the small mountain town of Uzès.
The drive there was gorgeous and the history is amazing. Celts created a settlement there before Romans moved in and then a duchy or kingdom was created. Parts of the castle remain
Perhaps if we hadn't parked in the parking garage just a few feet from this restaurant then we wouldn't have been smitten.

The restaurant once served as the stables for the castle. 

But we did park there at 2:30 and began to walk toward the village when the restaurant's proprietor stepped outside and motioned us into the restaurant assuring us that, of course, it was not too late for lunch. Many French restaurants have strict hours for eating. 12:30- 2:30 are general hours. Since the French take a couple of hours for lunch or dinner, there isn't a lot of leeway for stretching those hours. 

After we were welcomed in, we sat in the restaurant with the white stone arches stretching over our heads and enjoyed our meals with a few other stragglers. Each course being served in its own time, in spite of the late hour that we began to eat.  

Earl had lasagna Bolognaise and I had a cod and potato dish mixed together in a casserole called gratinè de brandade de morue, along with salad on the side.

For dessert I had goat cheese while Earl chose tiramisu. Of course, we shared both. 

After a photo, the restaurant owner gave us directions for finding the tourism office.

The tourism office gave us a map and a bit of history, but we stopped at a chocolate shop and the man behind the counter gave us a route to take as we walked around the town. We wandered through the charming town, where the sun still wasn't shining, past the castle  

and a Medieval Garden

We made our way to the cathedral, dominated by a high tower,

 

and we spent quite a bit of time lollygagging at the overlook. Somewhere in the distance was the Pont du Gard, which carried water from this village, Uzès to Nimes, about 16 miles away.

We walked back through the village, the skies still cloudy and had coffee in a charming square where the students gathered after they got out of school.

And my overwhelming feeling throughout the day as we walked the cobblestone streets was that I could live here too.
Darn it! I feel that way about so many of the towns and villages.
As we walked back to the parking garage where we had left the car, I saw a parking garage Zamboni. Just a guy on a little blue cart, making sure the parking garage is spotless.

He's under the red arrow -- not that I planned it that way. 

How can you not love this country?

So there's another small town where I could happily live. 

Thanks so much for playing along with Dreaming of France. Please leave your link below and visit each other's blogs to share your love for France.

Dreaming of France -- Food

Please join this weekly meme. Grab a copy of the photo above and link back to An Accidental Blog. Share with the rest of us your passion for France. Did you read a good book set in France? See a movie? Take a photo in France? Have an adventure? Eat a fabulous meal or even just a pastry? Or if you're in France now, go ahead and lord it over the rest of us. We can take it.
Obviously, food is a huge draw to France.
In France, I eat a lot of things that I might not at home.  American foie gras? I don't think so. I'm not even likely to eat lamb or duck when I'm in the United States, but those are my go-to meals when I'm in France.
But my all time favorite thing to eat when I'm in France is salad with goat cheese.
Usually, the salads have little pieces of toast with rounds of goat cheese on them. If I'm careful in my bite calculations, I can have a bit of toast and goat cheese with each bite of salad.

This salad had three separate kinds of goat cheese and I forgot to take a picture until I had eaten half of it. 

This salad in Marseille had wedges of deep-fried goat cheese. 

Luckily, I found goat cheese salads pretty much everywhere we went. 

How bout  you? Is there something that you look forward to eating in France?

Please leave a comment and visit each other's blogs to share more about your love for France.

Dreaming of France -- Dèjá Pre-Vu

Please join this weekly meme. Grab a copy of the photo above and link back to An Accidental Blog. Share with the rest of us your passion for France. Did you read a good book set in France? See a movie? Take a photo in France? Have an adventure? Eat a fabulous meal or even just a pastry? Or if you're in France now, go ahead and lord it over the rest of us. We can take it

This post may have a tenuous link to France, but it does deal with my feelings about France.
Yesterday afternoon, my daughter Grace and I made strawberry jam together. I was wondering whether people in other countries made homemade  jams or whether that was something that goes back to our pioneer roots here in the United States.

It was while I was stirring the long metal spoon in the thick strapberry mixture, watching it ripple and bubble in a rolling boil that I had a flash, a moment, where I suddenly saw myself and my daughter cooking in France and the idea filled me with joy. I felt sure the intuition took place in Arles, in that little restaurant that Van Gogh frequented and painted so beautifully. Then it was called The Café Terrace on The Place du Forum.

Here's a picture from a trip my husband and I took to Arles. The cafe now goes by the name of the artist who made it famous.

Maybe I had this vision because I've been reading lots of books about France. Maybe it was because my daughter stood next to me in her La Chatelaine uniform, still smelling like the coffee she helps serve in the French bistro. Or maybe I'm actually prescient and it will happen someday that Grace and I will be cooking at Café Van Gogh, even though we've never had any inclination to run a café in France.

As we continued the jam-making process, the steam rising up like so many dreams, I told Grace about my vision.

"Oh," she exlaimed. "I had a dream last night that we were running a restaurant."

"See!" I squealed. "Maybe it will come true."

"But, there was a werewolf too," she remembered.

"Well, maybe just part of it will come true," I said. 

How are you dreaming of France today?

I'm also linking with Paris in July today, and many days throughout the month.

Dreaming of France -- Good Meals, Bad Meals

Please join this weekly meme. Grab a copy of the photo above and link back to An Accidental Blog. Share with the rest of us your passion for France. Did you read a good book set in France? See a movie? Take a photo in France? Have an adventure? Eat a fabulous meal or even just a pastry? Or if you're in France now, go ahead and lord it over the rest of us. We can take it.
Food is always a big draw for visitors to France. I'm not a foodie. I don't plan specific meals that I will eat or arrange tours at chocolateries or take cooking classes -- not that I wouldn't love to do all of those things.
I can't think of many meals that I haven't enjoyed in France.
Well, one does come to mind.
Earl and I enjoyed the book Luncheon of the Boating Party by Susan Vreeland, and last time we went to France together we decided to eat at the restaurant which inspired the painting by Renoir.
The setting did not disappoint us, but the food was not as tasty as I'd expected from a French restaurant, even a mundane French restaurant.
The restaurant is located along the Seine outside of Paris. We took a train then muddled our way along the streets in search of the river and the restaurant.
We were there in April, so it was asparagus season.

The markets in Paris were full of thick stalks of white asparagus. So we both ordered asparagus for a starter but were disappointed by the limpness (make your own sexual joke here).

Even the dessert, although pretty, was a little bland. 

 
My favorite meal in France is usually breakfast, and I like to eat it at the hotel.
The pitcher of coffee and the pitcher of steamed milk alongside the basket of croissants and mini jars of jam. Yum.

Do you have a favorite meal in France?

I hope you'll visit each others' blogs to see more posts on Dreaming of France. 

Pre-Valentine Dinner

My husband and I may not get a chance to spend any time together on Valentine's Day, so tonight I picked him up from work and we went in search of a restaurant. Who expected restaurants to be packed on a Wednesday evening?

I guess it's a good sign for the economy that we couldn't find parking at the Irish place Brazenhead, and at the next place, the valet parking was blocking the road because it was so packed. 

We ended up at our old standby, Roma Trattoria. I had spaghetti and meatballs.

And we both enjoyed a glass of wine. Mine was a Malbec from Argentina. Very smooth. 

Hope everyone feels loved on Valentine's Day and every day.

Saturday Snapshot -- College Paradise

To participate in the Saturday Snapshot meme, post a photo that you (or a friend of family member) have taken. Then leave a direct link to your post on West Metro Mommy. Photos can be old or new, and be of any subject as long as they are clean and appropriate for all eyes to see. How much detail you give in the caption is entirely up to you. Please don't post random photos that you find online.
I keep saying that my life is going to slow down and I'm going to have more time to devote to blogging. That's not happening so far, but maybe soon since my second son is safely delivered to college in Florida.
Here's a picture of the two of us sitting on the deck of The Hurricane restaurant on St. Petersburg Beach. It's become a tradition now for us to have lunch at The Hurricane before dropping him off for a year on his own.

Even though he towers a foot taller than me, I still feel that twang in my belly when we drive away from campus knowing I won't see him again for at least three months.

Waiting in the Heat

It was almost a perfect ballet. Entrances, jettes, and exits perfectly timed. Until a trip, smack, failure. Which is why I am standing in front of a restaurant in the 95-degree heat typing a blog post on my cell phone.
These are the chances we take in our attempt to be a two-car family with four drivers.
Earl loses out most the time, riding his bike to work in the heat or hoisting his bike onto the front of a city bus then riding home on the bikepath late at night as bunnies swerve into his path.
I usually drive to work. When the weather is perfect, I'll ride my bike. If the car is needed, I'll get dropped off and picked up.
Grace's lifeguarding job is far enough away that she needs to drive or get a ride. She also takes a class two nights a week and drives to that.
Spencer should walk. He rarely leaves our little burg and his job is less than a mile away. But he has claim to the extra car because he helped pay for it. Officially, we call it "Spencer's car."
I was the only one available to attend Earl's sister's birthday dinner. This is a milestone birthday for her, grandmother of Caroline. Even though everyone else in the family had some place to be, I carefully orchestrated a driving schedule.
Earl took the bus to work. Spencer drove to work, and Grace dropped me at the shopping center, adjacent to the restaurant, an hour early so she could get to class on time.
I browsed the Barnes & Noble for an hour then crossed the baking parking lot to the restaurant.
A text from Tucker came in as I walked. "Throwing up. Terrible headache."
"Sorry," I texted back.
"Nosebleed now," he texted next.
"You r falling apart," I responded. Then I called him. "You want me to come home?"
"No, I'm okay," he said.
I entered the coolness of the restaurant -- a faux Italian and looked forward to some sort of sunrise cocktail and maybe a Caesar salad.
I told the hostess I was meeting a group. "Could it be a different name?" she asked me. "How about Jenny?"
No, that wasn't the group I was meeting.
I called a niece to double check. I knew I was at the right restaurant. Then I realized I was at the wrong location. The other location was about a 15-minute drive away.
Oops. I didn't have a car.
So I called our neighbor Sandy and asked for a ride home. The driving plan failed with my location mix up. Luckily, Sandy didn't mind coming to pick me up, which is why I was standing in the heat in front of a restaurant where I would not get a nice Italian meal or a sunrise cocktail, but I did come home to make sure my little boy was okay.
No one said it would be easy having two cars in a 4-driver family. Good thing we have reliable neighbors.

Dinner with French Friends

Last night we went to dinner with Danuta (who is Polish but married a Frenchman nearly 30 years ago), her daughter Agnes who is 27, and her son Vincent who is 19. This family is not typically French because -- one, they don't have a television, and two, they are passionate about music. Their entire family play instruments or sing. Vincent came to Paris to composer school when he was 14. We were visiting then when he took his exams, which required writing the part for different instruments and voices for some kind of classical music. The family has three other children and the husband, Michel, was not in Paris.
We met them for dinner at about 8:30 and we begin to wander down Rue Mouffetard in search of a restaurant. There are tons of restaurants but they did not meet the requirements of the French family. They are very picky about their food. Vincent has been this way since he was little. He would not eat the noodles that the other children were served, but wanted a grown up meal.
Inevitably, he argued with his mother at each place we paused. But this was not a real restaurant, this was only a bistro. He called a cousin who knew the area well to get her opinion. He spoke to his father.
Danuta rejected a number of places because they were winter foods -- fondue or raclettes. Those were for skiing season, she explained.
We finally settled down to eat dinner out doors a little after nine. Truthfully, it wasn't a great choice. The restaurants in France have different priced "Menus." Each menu has starters or entrees, then the meal or plats then dessert. Sometimes the "Menu" includes wine as well.
I wanted the goat cheese salad, but there wasn't a plat to choose from that looked great. I ended up with steak au poivre - that's a pepper sauce, but basically it was covered in gravy. The salad was terrific and luckily filled me up mostly. Also the dessert I chose was chocolate mousse -- lighter than air but much more scrumptious.
Earl had onion soup -- of course that was French onion, and Danuta didn't tell him he should have had a warm weather choice. He ordered turkey cordon bleu -- basically deep fried turkey. We were both pretty disappointed in our dinner choices. Earl's dessert was Tarte Normande, which is an apple tart with creme fraiche on the side. His dessert was good too.
Agnes got fish and it was like surgery for her to eat it. Yes, it looked like a real fish lying there on her plate. She used her knife and fork to carefully pul out the meat, looking for tiny bones.
The company was the point of the meal though and we enjoyed catching up on all of the friends and relatives.
Earl bought Vincent a coke because when he was 14 and we were having dinner near l'Opera (Oh, a truly great restaurant as Vincent recalls), Vincent and his father fought. Vincent wanted a Coca Cola but his father told him, "You'll drink wine like the rest of us." Our friends in the U.S. get a kick out of that story.
We left the restaurant after 11 and walked back to the apartment where Vincent and Danuta were staying for the night before catching the train back to Nantes in the morning. Vincent was going to play the piano for us, but since it was after 11:30 we cancelled the piano date
"Vincent plays very passionately," Danuta explained, and it was too late at night for such a raucous piano concert. He will play for us when we visit Nantes at the end of the week.
Agnes headed home to her Paris apartment while Earl and I walked back to our hotel.

Earlier in the day, Earl and I went on an excursion. We stopped for cups of hot tea to give us some energy. 9 Euros was the cost. That's basically $13 for two cups of tea. Then we went to Luxembourg Gardens to walk around. Everyone in Paris was there to enjoy the beautiful weather.

The seats and the benches and the walls were all full of people. The areas of grass in the center remained pristine. No one is allowed to walk on the grass, much less lay on it or sit on it.