What a lovely Sunday!!

1) Me and the tulips!
2) L’Isle Adam bridge3) Statue in the river;
4) Lovely stretch of water;
5) Me with Alain and Graciela

Allo! Allo!

Remember my resolution to write each night, regardless? Well, so much for resolutions…Sunday dawned bright and beautiful – cities look so VERY different when the sun is shining, don’t they? And after tidying up and doing yet another load of laundry (now remember, also, that “load” is ambiguous, considering the SMALL size of the washing machines!!) to spread around the apartment, we were off on our circuitous route to the country.

First, we walked through the Luxembourg and down Rue Bonaparte to Saint-Germain-des-Pres to look at a restaurante called L’Entrecote. Supposed to be quite good, and we wanted to find it and take a look – especially to find out hours and days – but, joke was on us; it’s not posted, even though the menu looked good! Possibly for a little later this week! From there we bused over to the Marche de Bastille – SO sorry we couldn’t get another chicken and other goodies, but what we really wanted were flowers to take out to Graciala.

Found some WONDERFUL tulips; two bunches, only 10E! And when the lady found out that they were for “une amie” she did an amazing job! Unwrapped both bunches, beautifully arranged them into one bunch; wrapped them with some sort of paper cord; trimmed the stems and wrapped them in clear cellophane! Voila! Just beautiful! From the market when then headed via bus to the Gare du Nord to catch the train.

We got their a bit early (which was good, as it’s not the easiest place to find your way around…) and caught the 11:14 train to Saint-Leu-le-Foret. Took about half an hour, so we were definitely early! Also, GREAT thing that we had our cell phone with us, as the two public phones took ONLY phone cards! Called Graciela, and Alain came down to the station to pick us up. (Think it wouldn’t be far to walk, if we knew exactly where we were going; lots of winding around in the car due to one-way streets.)

A truly beautiful day, and especially nice to be able to spend it in the country! Alain and Graciela’s house backs on to “le foret” and the flowers are just starting to come up all over. So hard to remember it’s still February!

Lovely lunch! We started on the glassed enclosed terrace with a pate de lapin with wonderful country bread. Moved into the house and the dining room for a casserole of canard with potatoes and oranges; yummy! A great cheese plate followed – will have to look for the cantal that was there; also lots of Roquefort. And this was followed by a wonderful apple tarte … followed by chocolate … we were STUFFED!

Then went for a lovely drive through the forest and over to l’Isle Adam, which is on the Oise River. Took a great walk – beautiful river, lots of flowering plants, both old and new bridges, as well as weeping willows. Quite, quite lovely!

Headed back to Saint-Leu as it got later, and Alain and Graciela dropped us at the train station. SOOOOO sorry to say goodbye; they are such fun; hope to see them again soon!

Got back to Paris around 6:30 and we were still so full from lunch, that we didn’t even give dinner a thought! In fact, I was in bed by 8:30! All in all, a lovely day!

Take care; more later!
Love,
m