War History

Arrival and night in Cherbourg - very close to the site of the Normandy landings. Utah beach next morning is beautiful - wild, cold and windswept. The museum brings alive the horror of what went on here, there's plenty to see, far more than the time we had allocated. Lots of stuff outside as well - old landing craft, artillery and memorial statues.

But we had an assignation that night, just north of Paris, to stay with Annie and Olivie. It was a bright morning and good driving conditions. so, as we had a long way to go we skipped our planned visit to the Bayeux tapestry, which was on our route. Olivie was leaving the next day and had a delicious seafood supper planned for us.

It took us more than five hours to get to Chris's friends' lovely home, just near Chateau de Chantilly, where Annie used to work. It's a pretty village house with a quirky collection of 'objets d'art', a lovely dog with an unpronounceable name and an aloof black cat. They have their own exit to the stylish walled garden from a basement that has several rooms. It's a tall narrow house and extends over four floors - plenty of exercise ensues, with all the stairs.

Ever since we visited the Mourne Seafood Bar on our way through Belfast, where I watched Chris enjoying a plate of oysters but felt too ill to eat any myself, I've been craving seafood. so was thrilled when our hosts produced a delicious meal of oysters, langoustine and scallops - accompanied by delicious pink bubbly. It was a memorable meal - thank you.

We've had sunny weather for most of our trip and on Sunday, after Olivie had brought us fresh French croissants and other goodies from the bakery, Annie lent us her Smart car, so we could visit the Chateau. It's very beautiful, but was bitterly cold. We hunted vainly for coffee and eventually gave up - we've nearly conquered Annie's complicated drinks machine, so lunched on a delicious, very ripe camembert, French bread, radishes and fine coffee.

We stayed an extra night, did copious amounts of laundry and prepared ourselves for a not too early start on Monday morning - we wanted to avoid the Paris commuter traffic. It's been a lovely sojourn with friends - but we have 'miles to go before we sleep...' 

This was an exciting weekend for Aimile too, as Olivie also has a Citroen 2CV. But I'll let Chris tell that part of the story.