Hello again everyone. Sorry once again for my long absence in updating the site. As you might imagine, I don’t have quite as much free time as I used to. As such, my time is spent (as much as possible) hanging out with Anna and Alexander.
Nevertheless, I hope this post will be the start of a string of 6-7 posts in the very near future to bring the site up to date. Once baby #2 arrives (assuming all goes well) in a couple weeks, I suspect ability to update will be (understandably) even more diminished. So, here we go.
Last fall, we had the pleasure of welcoming some of our good friends from Wisconsin in Provence. Becky, Eric and Andrea were able to hang out with us for about a week. I can’t speak for them, but we had a lot of fun. 🙂 You know how there are those people who are good house guests and others who are a little less good? Well, the three of them were fabulous house guests.
Here are a few images of their time with us (these are a mix of everyone’s images). This particular one is jumping ahead chronologically to Corsica, but I thought it would be nice to start with an image of all six of us.
As you know, I enjoy wine and the local region has a number of very good producers. Plus, in France, nearly all the wineries offer free tastings of their product line. This is contrast to other parts of the world. No names, but … pretty much all of California (sorry Jewls), where the price is a bit higher … plus, the feel is much less touristy, outside the big houses in Bordeaux/Burgundy/Champagne of course. This photo is from Domaine St. Hilaire. The make a few delicious wines.
Here we are hanging out one of the first evenings.
Eric has found the other alcohol. The green bottle is Icelandic schnapps. It’s wicked stuff. Kinda like tequila for some people, this makes you (or at least, me) do crazy things … like get in a freezing cold pool in the middle of the night. Fortunately, I lived to tell the tale.
Yep, Andrea finished the glass.
Can you tell they’re sisters?
We also took a trip a little north of our house to three of my favorite wine villages: Châteauneuf-du-Pape, Gigondas and Beaumes de Venise. This image of Eric and Becky is from a great restaurant at the foot of the Château, Verger des Papes.
THIS is a seafood salad. Yum. Good choice of subject, Andrea.
This is what went with the meal… Ok, just the bottle of wine and the rest was for Alexander. Oh, and he didn’t partake in the wine, just the Teddy Grahams and puffs.
Looking thoughtfully at Eric.
Andrea in the ruins of the former summer château of the Pope, when they were based in Avignon.
An interesting perspective that Andrea found of the owner of Domaine de la Charbonnières. She gave a great tour of her small family run business … plus samples of her magnificent products.
The sisters in the huge wine-makers hands of Beaumes de Venise.
We went again to the beautiful seaside town of Cassis.
Plus, took a tour of the Calanques. Alexander had a good time.
Another boat… this was the ferry to Corsica… All six of us piled into this tiny room for a night. Although it was a tight squeeze, this way we were able have a bed during the voyage AND take our car with us to drive around the island.
Sunrise in the port of Bastia. This image was made by Becky.
A snack by the sea.
Once we got to the southern side of the island, we took another boat ride to fully appreciate the natural beauty from the sea.
A view from our hike around the Lavezzi Islands. The are very beautiful, but dangerous to sail around … especially during storms. You can see a white cemetery in the background. This is where nearly 600 sailors and soldiers are interred. They were aboard the Sémillante, a French warship, when it was wrecked February 15th, 1855. en route to the Crimean War in the Black Sea. Sadly, all 700 aboard were lost. Those who were found were buried here. This was one of the single largest single losses in the French navy’s history.
Eric and Becky on the beach.
Andrea and Becky.
A golden Andrea.
Anna and I.
The little man checking out the sand on his hand.
Eric wanted to show the setup of my shots… I know, it’s a lot of gear.
I also wanted to test the water and didn’t have my swim suit. Yes, I know, I know, I look a little ridiculous.
Some of the beautiful but dangerous rocks.
Heading back to the cliff top city of Bonifacio.
The rock that looks like a giant ship.
The spectacular clifftop village of Bonfacio. It’s impressive to see from the village itself, but even more so when you go down and look up from the sea.
Bonifacio again. On the left side, you can see a stairway that was cut into solid rock. It’s called the King of Aragon Stairway. It was built around 1420 and legend has it that the stairway was built overnight during a siege of the city, by King Alphonso V (AKA Alphonso the Magnanimous). However, more likely, it was built to access potable water in the cave underneath by the Franciscan monks … and took MUCH longer than a single night.
Here you can see just how precariously the city approaches the edge of the cliff.
Part of the boat trip was to go into this cave. It look impossibly small for our rather large boat to enter. However, it just barely made it through this opening.
Here are the three beautiful ladies on top of the cliff.
We drove up the west side of the island and left from Napoleon’s birth city, Ajaccio.
Well, that wraps up our little tour of Provence with our good friends. We hope to host them again in the near future. Eric and Rebecca were kind enough to return the favor for one night in January when we went back to Wisconsin. As expected, they are as good at hosting as they are house guests. 🙂
It was simply a great week.
Until the next time… I’ll be posting images from our short trip to Malta.
–Jim