Where to begin!? The last week or so has been a non stop adventure between working with Mike and Roseann, playing in the pool and trampoline with Olivier, adventuring by bicycle all around Normandy and as of yesterday taking the train south to Villefranche sur mer (a little town next to Nice).
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| the abby near Roseanne and mike sans roof. |
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| the entrance view to the abby |
As we finished up our last week at Mike and Roseann's we did a little more exploring by bike and rode to a local Abbey that was in a somewhat state of ruins. The bike ride was around 25 minutes to the old Abbey and included a bee flying down my shirt and stinging me but otherwise Sarah and I made it no problem! The Abbey was made in 1140 and after it closed down the government sold pieces of the property off. One of the farmers who purchased the nave part of the property tried to tear it down to sell the stone but it was built so solidly that only the roof collapsed and all the other structures are still in very good states. In 1940 a doctor and his family purchased the lot and ever since have been restoring it and having tours go through to learn all about the history. It is still not a huge attraction so there was no tour in English but Sarah fearlessly translated for me as we strolled around looking at all the old cottages, kitchens etc.
That evening Olivier had some friends and their parents come over and Sarah and I were put on BBQ duty and attempted and successfully cooked so much meat we had leftovers for the rest of the time we were there. The evening ended with a bonfire and then off to bed relatively early (midnight) so that we could wake up and go to the Agri-cyclo-cool, a crazy name for an even crazier event.
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One of the agri-cyclo-cool participants
who greeted us at one of the stops |
We heard about the ACC through Roseann as she had gotten a flyer but didn't really know what to expect, thinking that it may
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one of the rentable lawn mowers
in the area, no joke! |
be only the 4 workawayers and a few others partaking we loaded up the bikes and drove over to the start at 9:30 where we were greeted by 80-90 normandy residents all excited to meet the internationals! The format was similar to a gran fondo or other type of charity ride that included meal stops and sights but this one led us all around to different farms, sights (such as the mayors new office and the local bakers house) and an excellent field where we had lunch. The event after the first two stops had snacks everywhere and at 1:45 all the cyclists turned into a field where lunch was provided that came complete with a whole bottle of cider, a huge bag of chips, a liter of water, sausage on half a baguette, potato salad with ham and kir (still wine with crême de cassis added).
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| Sarah, Ben and Ana enjoying lunch at ACC |
They even gave us dessert which was a chocolate/ toffee eclair which was incredible. The challenge following lunch was one where you were blindfolded and had to stick your hand in a bucket of grain to see if you could guess what it was, I was volunteered unwillingly and realized that its very hard to figure out what kind of grain it is after it has been ground up and even harder to translate what I thought it was in english into french :)
All the events ended around 6:30pm and awards were given out including last place for us on the international team haha. We ended the evening back at our hosts house with cake and balloons for Ana's birthday (one of the workawayers) then proceeded to pack up and prepare for a day of travel.
After saying our goodbyes to everyone on Monday we boarded the train to Paris at 3:24 and made it
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| Sarah and I in Villefranche heading to dinner! |
to Paris after a couple train problems but nothing too drastic. Once in paris we jumped on the metro to make it to another train station (i think there are 7 train, not metro, stations in paris alone) and grabbed some dinner in Paris before boarding our 12 hour train ride to Nice Ville. While people watching in Paris, we saw ladies riding city bikes in heels, a man on something like a one-wheeled segway with nothing to hold on to, and so many cool city dogs. The 12 hours went by pretty fast (on the way back we already purchased the bunk bed option) even though we were only in reclining chairs but by 9:30am the following morning we had made it to Nice and found our way to Villefranche. Luckily our hotel is amazing and let us check in early and upgraded us to an amazing room for free so we didn't have to lug around our backpacks all day so after meet and greet with the hotel owners and them showing us where to go and what to do we headed off to the beach and successfully avoided getting sunburnt! A first!
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| our small little town and one of the beaches |
Since it is such a tourist area a lot more people speak english (many with a scottish accent though) so that has been a bit refreshing but overall this place is amazing and a very nice vacation within a vacation. More pictures will be coming soon as we explore the surrounding areas of Villefranche so until next time, Au revoir!
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