Trip round France

08 July 2010

Marie is just back to Scotland from a busy and hectic 3 week tour round France checking out hotels and little restaurants. She was invited to a 5 night stay in the Toulouse, Cahors and Rocamadour area with the Lot Tourist Office and had an extremely interesting tour.

When she was in France,  she has signed up to rent a row of vines on the edge of the plateau for 2 years in the Cahors area and is now a "vigneronne" as they say in France!!

Let's follow the weather and hope mid September will produce a good crop of grapes!!! -- Watch the space ---

 She found some little hotels like "gems" which were wonderful and unknown to tourists. Each one was like a little hidden oasis.

Marie found some lovely little restaurants and will be delighted to share these with you as France is her passion!

She had the good luck of getting a ticket for a concert of Vivaldi's Four Seasons being performed in the Madeleine church in Paris, another for a Chopin recital in the wonderful Sainte Chapelle in Paris ( built for the "Sun King" with beautiful and stunning stained glass windows) and not only that, but met a lovely elderly lady in Bayeux who was a distant cousin of Chopin and actually resembled him!

More interesting luck  -  they transformed the Champs Elysees into "fields of the Elysee Palace" with a huge farmers market and made it into fields of grass, sunflowers and vines!! See the photos on the website - sunflowers, grass, vines, cattle, trees ---  on the Champs Elysees - the name actually means the "fields of the Elysee Palace"

She was also invited by her hotel (celebrating 25 years) to an outdoor production of Shakespeare's Julius Caesar in the Bois de Boulogne in Paris!

Marie made great contacts in all the areas where she went and even found evidence of a historic Scottish boat in Honfleur harbour!

What a trip and what really wonderful experiences!!! Let us all at France Made Easy share those with you too!