Bright and early on Monday, May 6th we rented a car (Peugeot with GPS thank goodness) and headed out for the countryside of Normandy and the famous Mont Saint-Michel.  It’s about a three hour drive through beautiful countryside.  The yellow flowers are called Oilseed Rape in Europe, Rapeseed in the US, and are used for animal feed and to make canola oil.  The fields makes for an awesome view out of a car!

When you arrive at Mont Saint-Michel you walk with purpose through a small – mostly very new – little shopping district, board a bus and voila, there you are!

Mont Saint-Michele has 30 full time inhabitants – presumably monks – but it has a booming tourist trade in the little shops and restaurants built into the hill below the Abbey and Church.  Here are some of the photos we took!

After climbing through the town and to the top of the hill, you get to the Church and the Abbey – where the monks lived. The self guided tour leads you all throughout the buildings! The first photos show the construction process of the island beginning in the 900’s!

After visiting Mont Saint-Michel and getting a quick dinner, we got back on the road for a quick 30 minute drive through the countryside.

Finally we arrived at the home of Carol and Jos Haynes.  They share their  beautiful home as a Bed and Breakfast.

You can see more about it at their website:  www.abreathoffrenchair.co.uk

After meeting with the Haynes over a cup of tea the girls did their homework, and we were off to bed! It was a long and very fun day!

After touring Versailles we were all a little tired and decided to take Sunday morning as a day of rest… after all, this is a very Catholic country and that’s what the good Lord intended.  On line we learned that Mass in English is offered at St. Joseph’s Church, near the Arc de Triomphe. And even better – they offer a Mass at 12:30pm, we can sleep in a bit!  St. Joseph’s is located in what looks like an office building – interesting in this land of Cathedrals. The Mass was very similar to what we’re used to and it was nice to hear so much English spoken all at once!!

Since we were right there, and it was a beautiful morning, another trip up the Arc was in order.  Some photos down the Champs Elysees and of the local surrounding were much better today!

This coming week is a real Holiday week.  Wednesday, May 8 is WWII Victory Day (la fête de la victoire, le jour de la libération) and is a holiday to celebrate the end of World War II and the French people’s freedom. It is the anniversary of when Charles de Gaulle announced the end of World War II in France on May 8, 1945.  Here you can see that they were getting ready for the celebrations.

Since the weather was so nice we decided to stroll down the Champs Elysee (with thousands of our closest friends) and then visit the Tuilerie Gardens…

After making our way home and doing some school work.  Kathleen, Caroline and Erin headed out for some pizza and Bob and Caitlin hopped on the Metro for Parc des Princes – the home stadium of Paris Saint Germain, the best soccer team in France.  After arriving at the stadium we stopped for a Coke to assess our dilemma.  We didn’t have tickets – and buying them on the street is illegal.  Now, it’s one thing to do that when you speak the language – it’s entirely something else when you don’t.  But after a few minutes of watching folks at the cafe, our plan took shape,  The gentleman below was seating people at the Cafe – and it became very clear that he knew everybody, and everybody knew him.  I asked him in my best broken French where I could buy “billets sur la rue.”

He brought me to a man, and said,  “Thees man – nobody else!”  It became immediately clear that we had been connected with the Godfather of scalping… the man – about 65 years old – was working two phones, both voice and text, at the same time. I explained that needed two seats together – that my petite fille must sit with me.  He’s said “C’est normale… bien.” And we walked the streets with him – following close as he said “Vite, vite!”  He met up with maybe six or seven different guys, and then magically, one appeared with two tickets. “Good seats, bon, bon, seats,” he said.  The deal was done. We were in…. and yes, they were “bon, bon, seats,” in the fifth row!!

It was a good game – although PSG did not win and thus clinch the league title.  We saw the best team in France come from behind to earn a draw with under seven minutes to play.

A night that neither Caitlin nor her dad will soon forget!

              The Kingsmen were probably not singing about King Loius XIV, the Sun King, when they rocked the house in 1955 but they could have been.  This guy knew how to live.  On May 4 we awoke early and took the train from Paris to Versailles – an easy 35 minute ride – to see Louis’ country house.

The train – very similar to the commuter rail in Boston is a double-decker affair and quite nice – it even comes with entertainment.

Versailles is a nice little town with an ostentatious mansion.  After a quick walk from the train station, we arrived at the palace.  Apparently a few (thousand) other folks had the same idea on this beautiful Saturday morning.  The lines were long… but the place is amazing.

We won’t use this blog to give a history of the mansion or a description of the rooms, but below are some of the better photos we took on our tour.  Erin thought all the rooms looked the same anyway!

The original part of the palace was built earlier as a hunting lodge in the country. These arched windows were the bedroom of Louis XIV both as a child and as king.

After seeing the residences of both the king and queen we headed out to the gardens….  WOW!!!  The Sun King thought pretty highly of himself. He felt that he controlled the whole world, both physical and natural. He loved to be outside, but he managed the outside like he managed everything else. The exterior of Versailles was just an extension of the inside – lavish and massive.  But, since we were getting a bit hungry, and since there are some nice restaurants hidden in the trees, we stopped for lunch.

After lunch we toured the gardens near the palace as well as the vacation homes for the vacation home – The Trianon Palaces.  These were a bit more simple and relaxed versions of Versailles and the place where Marie-Antionette (the wife of King Louis XVI) decided to make her home. We also decide that our outfits matched this house better!

After seeing the Trianon village area, we headed back to see the gardens and fountains with the water working! The gardens were designed to be like outdoor parlor rooms where people could meet and chat… all with different gravity fed fountains.  The water only comes on for a couple of hours, three days a week… so our time was limited as to which ones we could see and photograph.. we did our best to see a bunch of them…

The fountains were terrific, and we were exhausted.  Caitlin’s and Bob’s allergies wrere beginning to get the best of them so a bit of ice cream and a train ride home seemed to be in order.  All in all, a bon jour in the “countryside.”