Cate’s Musings

Well, internet access in France was not what I had hoped, thus my lack of posts. The modem arrived at my sister Sarah’s house the day before I left, so while she’s online NOW, she wasn’t for most of my stay.

Anyhow, the visit was great. I had lots of relaxing time doing not much of anything and lots of time spent with my sisters Alissa & Sarah, and Jourdain and Cecilia, my fantastic niece and nephew. Here’s a brief re-cap of the trip with photos. I’m in the process of putting all the pictures up on my Flickr page, so if the shots below simply don’t satisfy your undying thirst for photos you can see more there.

[I'm fairly new to the whole Flickr thing but I imagine I'll be uploading bucketloads of stuff, old and new, over the next few weeks. Unemployment is good for that sort of thing.]

So! The trip:

Things got off to a rocky start when our flight from NYC to Paris was delayed by 4 hours. This caused us to miss our train south from Paris. The silver lining was that we spent the night in Paris and got to have an impromptu dinner with our good friend Anne. Here she is with her boyfriend Hervé (please note the giant pile of couscous!):

We got the first train down to Valence the next morning, rented a car and began our drive up to Sarah’s house which is in La Chapelle en Vercors. I say ‘up’ because it’s in the mountains. And the drive is not for the weak. The roads in this part of France have all sorts of hairpin turns and cliff-side drop offs. Often times the side of the mountain is simply blown out to make room for the road:

We managed to make it in one piece (not without getting lost though – Google maps neglected to take into account a years-long road closure). Once arriving, we spent the next week and half doing such things as:

Going on walks:

Feeding the rabbits at the neighbor’s farm (no need to mention the impending fate of the bunnies to the kids, of course):

Visiting the Choranche caves:

Eating ice cream:

Picnicking:

And coloring. Lots and lots of coloring. It’s important business, you know:

Lastly, here are my 2 favorite photos of Jourdain and Cecilia, followed by a shot of a small waterfall and river that gives you an idea of the look of the area. It’s a beautiful part of the world, and I’m looking forward to going back.

I’m heading off on Monday to France for about a week and a half. And while it might sound romantic, my visits to France are not so much about romance but all about family. My mother is French and moved back there about 3 years ago after living in the states for several decades.

This visit, however, is not to see my mom (she’s currently in the states for a few months) but to see my sister who lives in Gabon, Africa. She will be in France for the summer trying to avoid Chikungunya, a virus carried by mosquitoes, during the last few months of her current pregnancy. So I’m going with my twin sister to spend some time with the older sis, niece and nephew. And I don’t know anything about your nieces or nephews, but mine are cute. Waaaayyyy cuter than yours. (And I’m not even factoring the 2 nieces who live here in LA into the equation. When I do it gets dangerous; there’s potential for a cuteness explosion.)

I’ll be staying at my sister’s house in an area of France called the Vercor which is located in the Drome department (marked on the map above). That probably doesn’t mean much to many people, but it’s an area I know because I’ve spent buck loads of time in the Ardeche department, located just west of the Drome. In fact I spent my entire 4th grade year there living in a house with this view:

But that’s another story.

[As a complete side note I realize now I didn't blog about my experience voting in the presidential election at the French consulate last month. It's one of the bonuses I get with dual citizenship and it was really something else. The way it worked was they gave me 2 pieces of paper, each with one of the names of the candidates on it. I put the one for the person I was voting for in the envelope and dropped it in a box. Seems logical to me! No dangling chads there. As usual, the candidate I voted for lost. Does anyone remember what it feels like to vote for someone who wins? Anyone?]

Anyhow, back to the issue at hand: the internet situation at the house in France is unclear. But I’ll be sure to blog something ‘a la français’ as soon as I’m able. Pictures and so forth coming soon!

[And as another side note- who are you people who read my blog??!? I can see on this magic computer that I have a bunch of people who read my RSS feed, and that the site gets a handful of hits a day. So leave a comment, drop me a line, let me know what you think!]