Un séjour à St. Rémy de Provence - 1

A big BONJOUR to every one!

 As you know, I was lucky enough to spend some time in my beloved France recently, (quelle chance!) so I thought I would share   a 'micro' series on St Remy de Provence  with you .....I have longed to visit this village since first reading about it  in  My French Life by the fab Vicki Archer , writer of the wonderful blog  French Essence...hope you enjoy!

St Remy is a beautiful old  village about half an hour south of Avignon,  where, amongst other things, Nostradamus was born, and Van Gogh painted 'starry night' :). It's population is around 10,000, give or take countless tourists!

google images

First up.....accommodation..... I found this little gem of a one bedroom  house for rent online...quite reasonably priced and in a brilliant position right in the heart of the the old centre.



Property #432754 HomeAway.co.uk

This is the upstairs bedroom..4 poster bed! So romantic..but so  @#*# hard!!

I thought this armoir was rather gorgeous....what do you think?

and my very own gorgeous old street lamp! (I'm so easily pleased! )

But to get to this point, one must swing off a thick rope up and down the ancient stone staircase  :)



I quickly got into the  swing of this...pun intended ;)

How often do you get to stay in a 500 year old house?! Love love love  all the stone work.

leading from the lounge  into the batcave  kitchen!

The old village centre is to die for, with all it's tiny  winding cobblestone streets .....



Entrance to old centre straight ahead.

One of the little 'Rues' in the old centre, with an abundance of cafes and restaurants....

And did I mention the boutiques to be found here?????????


OHHHH

MON

DIEU!!!

Gorgeous , right??? I know!! I was in heaven!

Of course we had to eat, and there was no shortage on choice.........

Sur la terrasse......

Some cozy ambiance perhaps.........

Or maybe just a sugar hit....its all there :)

Have I tickled your tastebuds yet??

More to come next week :)

A Bientôt, Gigi  x 

Charles de Gaulle airport to city centre / CDG à centre ville

Woops....4 weeks and no blog I hear you say? Well, yes I know, but I'm hoping for forgiveness as I've been jaunting around France with Monsieur! Forgiven then? Great!

The first couple of days on arrival in Paris are always a mixed bag....EXHAUSTION  being the first thing that  comes to mind!

  But then there is also that feeling on stepping from the flight into  Charles de Gaulle airport... for me, it's a wonderful sensory  overload......

I close my eyes and breathe in deeply.....there is nowhere else I could be....this is Paris! There is a certain something in the air and I love it!  Below is a Charles de Gaulle airport promo video you may enjoy...must admit they paint a very 'friendly' picture.......;)

The loud speakers break out into a foreign language.....I gulp, knowing the weight of conversing with these parisians  is placed firmly on MY shoulders......I try to settle myself a little ...but alas my brain seems to have  gone and  lost itself in a sleepless fog!


Not to worry, we just follow along like sheep to  baggage claim, straight through customs etc  then , with the help of good signage (french AND english) we head to the shuttle train which takes us to the station to catch the RER into town.

I have made my way into the city before with several different forms of transport....

First visit , not knowing what we were doing, we booked a private car.....I can remember being SOOO elated when I saw MY surname  being held up in CDG...I was famous!! Chauffeur driven  into town in a gorgeous Mercedes ,  and taking in the sights I had only ever seen in photos, it rendered me almost speechless when I caught my first glimpse of  Hotel des Invalides (the resting place of ole Napoleon himself)

  The bill actually DID  leave me speechless! ;)

Then there was the hair raising  trip in on a shared shuttle bus......going through dark tunnels, passing other cars at the speed of sound....seated what felt like an inch from the window screen, I truly thought I was going to die!  Everyone else in the bus thought I was going to die too, apparently that's how it sounded.... This guy was looking for a tip too !..and what's more is  I gave him one..... for NOT KILLING ME! So ok,  I'm not the worlds' best passenger, but what I'm saying is if you enjoyed the Fast and the Furious flicks..perhaps this is for YOU :)

Another time I thought I would try a taxi...but I made sure to instruct the cabby to drive  'slowly'...I think he thought I was a madwoman! So off we  went  with speedy gonzales at the wheel, mmm, I'm thinking..mmm this isn't exactly slow..but I'll cope.That was until  out of nowhere, a car that had been going the opposite direction decided to flip itself over the middle barricade and land squarely in the middle of the highway in front of us..on its head! Uuuummm..THAT'S WHY I ASK TO GO SLOW!!!

Anyway, my preferable transport into town is definitely the RER train..safe and inexpensive.....my kind of ride :)

Lots of 'frenchy' things to share with you , so keep sneeking a peek through the window !

A Bientôt,  Gigi

French windows / Les fenêtres françaises

Who's interested in doing a quick ' french window' tour around France today?  Pourquoi pas you say? (why not), ...Ok.....let's go!

Brittany

Pinterest.com

google images.   I want this!

Bordeaux

Not so many flowers in windows here, as they rely on the art of the wrought iron....gorgeous!

greenart.com

Avignon

Loving the reflexion :)

reflectionsandnature.blogspot.com.au

Biarritz

Big big big by the sea....................

Hotels.com

 Chamonix

Imagine waking up to this on first day of holidays.....sigh....:)

trip advisor. Hotel Les Randonneurs

And of course.................Paris!

J'adore window stencils....so ...so...frenchy?!

google images.

A mellow yellow 'petite dejeuner' ...you would hardly want to leave here :)

apartmentsforsaleparis.com

but you would :)

So which windows do you prefer?  

Lots of wrought iron?

Lots of flowers?

or lots of both???!!  (moi moi moi!!!)

A bientôt,  Gigi