Bread product and alcohol. Universal.

Hellllo

Happy Birthday, elder sister!!! You will be receiving tokens of my affection probs around the start of next week. Got a little behind. But we respect that. Xoxo

Yesterday. A Beaune Jour.

3 points for excessive word play. The city is Beaune so –

1) A good day in Beaune

2) A good (bon) day (jour)

3) And sounds like “bonjour”

I am so crafty. Me and half the names of the shops in the city. Although it was suitable since about 80% of the people seen there were tourists.

Beaune is this mecca of wine in Bourgogne (the region around Dijon) so everything talks about to at least mentions wine. Liz, Alex, and Kassie went for some of the 453784 choices of places to taste wine in the town (20,000 people) but Louisa and I explored since we’re not huge into that. Although Alex returned with such a glowing smile on his precious little scruffy Anglo face (and a purchase of the least inexpensive option) that I may before I leave…

Louisa and I found lots of interesting things to look at though. Not an afternoon to be wasted although the weather (as always, but not today!!!) was rainy and mildly eghhh. We found this amazing church where there was a wedding going on and watched as some poor friend struggled to get the cans tied to the bumper of their car. We found another church that was physically less impressive but they bells were ringing. Seriously – they were ringing. They actually moved!!

This was possibly the most exciting event of the day for me. Church bells never really ring anymore it seems (in my extensive knowledge). They have some little machine that bangs them from the inside and the bells themselves don’t swing. We could see the bells swinging. Amazing. Awesome.

One of the best things about old towns like this, and lots of France in general, is that it’s so easy to visualize how it was 100 years ago or even 500 years ago. The skylines are amazing (took a lot of pictures). When looking down an alley, it’s not like looking down a street and it goes forever with nothing interesting, it always stops or turns and at the end it seems the there is, inevitably, an amazing church spire. This is at least the case in all the centre villes (centers of town) because they were the original town and then they exploded outwards.

Meanwhile…

As they exploded outwards. They built things like Carrefour. The enormous supermarkets where Kassie, Louisa, and I ventured to find the ingredients for American pancakes. That was a challenge in itself since if it’s thicker than a crepe they don’t want it! (the unofficial tagline of the country). Also, Carrefour is so damn large that some of the employees wear roller blades. Thought that we were going to pass out from laughing internally. Tried to subtly take a picture. The first time I missed completely and the second time I forgot to turn off the flash. Curses!! Luckily my camera has a superman zoom lens so they were unable to locate the stupid American from 50 paces.

We found things and then promptly returned to my abode to make a huge mess which was all craftily erased by Mireille’s return. We hung out for a long time. Had a little sing a long. Good times.

Today we’re going to the lake near to where Louisa is staying. It’s a little cold but we’re pretty desperate for nature. And it’s finally sunny!! Get our of your pjs, Jean-Pierre, we’re going to the lake!!

Pictures and highlights to follow.

Bonne journeeeeeee