J’aime la France!

Travelling in France was a terrific experience. I found the people to be very almost universally friendly and helpful and patient with my horrendous French. Though I learned a bit in school, I’ve spent a lot more time and energy recently developing my Spanish. Frustratingly, I found myself inserting Spanish vocabulary into French phrases. Towards to end of the trip, it started to get a little better.  It seemed that people were more willing to let me continue in my halting French, rather than immediately switching to English as has often happened when travelling in other countries.  I appreciated the opportunity to have a go at it and no one laughed at my atrocious accent!

I heard recently that the French government applied for UN-recognized heritage status for traditional French gastronomy.  While we didn’t experience the “haut cuisine”, we certainly enjoyed the more everyday sort of cooking.  Crusty baguettes, croissants, pastries seem the breakfast of choice. Crepes and galettes, savory buckwheat crepes, were also delicious treats. River was skeptical of crepes at first, but had an epiphany in this cafe:

Fresh baguettes were available everywhere. The kids even had hot dogs inside a baguette!

I tried the regional specialty in Carcassonne called cassoulet, a white bean casserole which was originally a peasant dish but now is an essential tourist experience.  I hadn’t really though of pizza as a particularly French food, but we ate quite a few delicious wood-fire baked pizzas.  Vineyards cover much of the landscape and we enjoyed many of the local wines.  These windmills were right in the middle of the grapes.

On the coast, much delicious seafood was available.

We also enjoyed the Mediterranean climate.  While we did have a couple of cool, windy days, the warm sun was a nice change from the British weather.  It was raining on arriving back in the East Midlands.  To be fair, it is wonderfully green here in Derby, but I wouldn’t mind visiting southern France again soon!