Oh I do like to be beside the seaside…..

Colourful huts on the beach

I'll have a cup of Tetleys!

Torquay: The English Riviera.  Colder than the Alps.  Two jackets, a woolly hat and a raincoat just in case! 

After I’d tried to hand our passports through a closed window to the passport control officer causing a few embarrassed giggles (well I had been ill and washing sick of my children’s clothes for the past few hours!), driving off the ferry and into Plymouth was a bit tricky.  Being on the right side (the left) of the road in a left hand drive car which caused confusion in itself, the wacky enormous roundabouts consisting of 5 lanes and traffic lights, tiny roads and loads of traffic didn’t do much to help!  Once we got out of the town and onto the motorways it was fine though, and we found our way to our accommodation quite easily.

Pattisseries and vineyards were replaced by pubs and amusement arcades, and the number of barbers’ shops on one street was unbelievable!  Our apartment was close to the high street, seafront and cinema (might get a chance to see Harry Potter!), and a 5 minute drive to Aunty Val’s in one direction and Lyndsey’s in another made it a good base to explore.  It was clean and comfortable if a bit cramped!

The weather wasn’t too good at the beginning of the week, but improved towards the end.  Although the four days wasn’t quite enough to catch up properly with all the family, especially working around the kids and Daisy still being at school.  We chose not to do any touristy things.  Being in England and so close to familiar shops we decided to do normal things like shopping!  We were impressed with how cheap things were and so treated ourselves to a few new items to add to our wrinkled wardrobe!

We took Amelia and Noah to an indoor play centre which was a converted church!  It was awesome fun, huge slides which you needed a mat for and a mini helter skelter.  We also had a couple of meals in restaurants that also had a playroom for the kids, one of them with soundproof windows so you could keep an eye on them but not hear a thing!

I also had a practice at driving from Lyndsey’s to our place, THE MOST STRESSFUL 5 MINTUES OF MY LIFE!!  Poor Amelia was even worrying from the back seat “No mummy don’t drive, can’t you drive Daddy?”  Stalled the car, took a few wrong turns, got beeped at a couple of times.  So much for “I’ll drive in England and Ireland Maciek”.  So much to concentrate on, staying close to the kerb, checking the mirror which is in the wrong place, gear stick in your right hand, indicators on the left, checking the speed limit which is in miles, trying to follow Karen’s voice on the sat nav, trying to stay in the correct lanes which sometimes disappear and you find yourself not knowing where on the road you’re supposed to be……really don’t know how Maciek has done it so far, he definitely copes with it far better than me!

Rainbows Funhouse

It was lovely to see Amelia and Daisy getting on so well (it reminded us of me and Lyndsey when we were little – one tall and blonde and the other short and brown, holding hands and playing tig on the way to the shops).

Val, Lynds, Simon, Daisy and us

Maciek was able to watch Le Tour de France, and it was nice to see some T.V in our own language!  We didn’t make it down on to the beach (not even in our woolly hats!), and I didn’t get to see Harry Potter.  But it was nice to be in familiar surroundings, read menu’s, be with family, and I love the sound of the seagulls at the seaside – reminds me of childhood holidays!

Nightmare on Pont Avon: Ferry from Hell

The Pont Avon

Up early in the morning to load the car and get to the port on time we noticed how windy and cold it was and Maciek even wondered whether the ferry would be sailing.  We’d been looking forward to a relaxing journey after a couple of very long drives in France so with fingers crossed, we arrived at the port in plenty of time, not a mention of any cancellations, so whilst we waited in the queue to embark we ate a small bread roll and banana to tide us over until we could enjoy a FULL ENGLISH BREAKFAST on board!!  Woo hoo!!

The ferry was enormous.  Amelia was so excited.  There were two cinemas, loads of restaurants, and an indoor play gym for the kids and heaps of space to sit.  We picked a spot right next to the kids gym and were feeling great about being able to sit in peace and eat our breakfast whilst the kids played.  I thought I might even get a chance to read my book, or maybe they were playing Harry Potter in the cinema?

As we took off, we were giggling at the amount of swaying going on.  I don’t usually feel travel sickness but I was beginning to feel uncomfortable after a short while. We wondered about the kids, given their past vomiting episodes in the car, but were reassured that they’d both had Kwells so surely they’d be fine, and they were busy playing anyway.  And we both took a Kwells just in case. 

The ferry was rocking considerably, and seemed to be rising up at the front and banging down into the sea sending waterfalls over the front windows.  I even joked to Maciek about sinking and then he said ‘it’s possible’ which wiped the smirk of my face!

Sick bag anyone?

Not long after that Maciek was sitting on the floor of the play area saying he didn’t feel too good and I noticed that Noah had been sick on one of the colouring-in tables.  Noah came to lie down on the floor near our seats but he was clearly uncomfortable and Maciek was lying across the seat looking so white he could have played the queen in an Elizabethan play (he’s even got the little red lips!)  Milly came to lie down just before Noah finally vomited, all over his teddy, and as I was cleaning it up Maciek joined in, crawling about on all fours sounding like a wounded donkey!  We had a small collection of sick bags on our table being slowly used up as Milly then started vomiting, only just grabbing a bag in time!  I felt awful but must have an iron stomach as nothing came up.  I went to the bathroom to attempt to wash Noah’s teddy and noticed people, including myself, staggering about like John Wayne after 10 bottles of bad wine!  The four of us slept on the floor for about an hour and a half, and when we woke up the sea and wind had finally settled, and people began emerging into upright positions again.  It was like the end of Sleeping Beauty, when everyone in the land wakes up from 100 years of sleep! Or maybe it was more like the bit from Michael Jackson’s thriller, when the zombie’s come to life and start groaning and staggering about!

What was meant to be a relaxing enjoyable journey turned into the most awful 5 hour ferry ride EVER!  So much for Kwells.  And the worrying part is, we’ve got two more ferry journeys to go, not including a 15 hour overnighter from the UK to Holland!  Eek!

Au Revoir France!

Roscoff

The past week has been a chance to unwind and chill out a bit, with no mountains to hike!  Except for a couple of days out we relaxed by the pool, or on the balcony, or even just on the couch with a coffee while Amelia and Noah played outside.  I had a chance to practice some driving (God know’s how Maciek has managed so far – it feels so weird!), I did okay though as it was such a small quiet village with no traffic apart from the odd cyclist or tractor!



Sunflowers



Driving through the countryside on our way to Roscoff we passed acres of sunflower fields (we’d been seeing them all week and by this point Noah was pointing out ‘sunflower’ instead of ‘bin’, which made a change and a much nicer thing to look at!).  But on the day we finally managed to take a photo of them, it was overcast, so they all had their heads down!  So unfortunately this picture doesn't show the blankets of yellow we saw everyday.

Another funny thing about France and Europe in general is smoking.  Nearly everybody smokes.  And most of the time it’s men driving cars, riding bikes, working on a building site, unpacking fruit that’s just been delivered to a shop, all with a cigarette seemingly glued to their top lip.  Don’t know how it stays there.  It’s like a symbol of the continent.  Man in cap (not a baseball cap, you know the ones) pedaling an old rickety bike through the village with cigarette stuck to top lip like an overgrown fang.  It’s just like the mandatory accordion player in touristy spots in the city.  It wouldn’t be Europe without it!

Another stupidly long drive brought us to the port of Roscoff.  We left our cottage at 10am and arrived at the Hotel L’Angleterre at 6.45pm!  We stopped for about 25 minutes along the way and Noah slept for 2 hours and nobody was sick.  Our hotel had no parking, so we had to park in a public carpark down the road and around the corner, which would have been no problem if it wasn’t for the 4 huge suitcases and various other back packs and bags we had to carry in (only to carry back out again in the morning and reload the car!).  And not only that, there was no lift.  And not only that, the staircase has to be the narrowest windiest one ever made.  And not only that the place was like a maze of these staircases and corridors, and the doors to get from one corridor to another were about as wide as two vertical 4 by 2 planks of wood!  At one point I just looked at Maciek and burst out laughing and couldn’t stop!

The pizza place at the back

Toot toot!!

We braved the weather (it was freezing and raining) to walk into the village for some dinner, which was so quaint and pretty (it looked and felt just like an English seaside village), and we enjoyed a lovely pizza (even if we were sitting outside as we’re too scared to dine in with Noah the Menace).  There was also a little fair/fete set up so Amelia and Noah had a ride and then Maciek bought us not one but two massive waffles piled high with cream!  So much for my diet then….

An Historical Day

The castle in the cliffs

We set out early on Thursday to fit in a few of the sights in this region, most of which are in the south east area, about an hour and half drive.  We began the day at Le Maison Forte de Reignac, which is a castle built into the cliffs.  It dates back 20,000 years as the caves were first used as dwellings for prehistoric man, and has been added to over centuries.  There are exhibitions of everything from stone age tools, skulls from various ages, drawings carved into the cave walls, kitchens, bedrooms and drawing rooms from more recent times (13^th century) to the dungeon area dedicated to an exhibition of an array of terrible torture instruments (yuk!). Even Maciek was impressed. 



Sarlat



From there we went to the town of Sarlat.  It’s such a well preserved Medieval town that it really is like being on a movie set, even more so than Soest.  All the buildings are built of the local Perigord stone which is golden in colour, and it’s a labrynth of narrow cobbled streets and alleys winding through arch ways and small market squares.  It never seems to end, and I was fascinated!  I wanted to explore every nook and cranny and climb every step that had been smoothed out and worn down in the centre from centuries of footprints – but that’s just me!

One of the many little alleyways

Although we were tired, we carried on to another village called Baynac on the river.  It’s just like Sarlat, only on a much smaller scale, and there is canoe hire on the river which is why we went.  But we found out you have to catch a bus which takes you to various points along the river then paddle back to the start, and the shortest one would have taken 2.5 hours, and as  it was already 4.30pm, we thought it would be a bit silly!

I had a great day.  Unfortunately the kids don’t share my love of all things old.  We went into the Roman Museum on Tuesday, and Amelia was asking ‘what was this in the olden days, and what was that used for in the olden days?’ and then asked ‘Where did we live in the olden days?’ to which I replied ‘we didn’t live in the olden days, we live now’ to which she sighed, slumped and dragged her feet and exclaimed ‘well why are we bothering to look at things from the olden days then!’ to which Maciek replied, a bit on the sarcastic side for my liking, ‘because it’s interesting.’

Cheese!!

Old things - BRILLIANT!

Happy 2nd Birthday NOAH!!

My first bike

nee naw nee naw nee naw!

On Tuesday in between small trips to nearby towns, including Brantome and Peregeux (the capital of this region) we managed to find a toy shop and bought Noah a little bike (no pedals, you can just run along and then lift up your feet!), a police car that turns into a fire truck by flipping over when it reaches a wall, and a shapes/colours/numbers puzzle (we snuck in a Rapunzel puzzle for Amelia too, all she talks about is Rapunzel).  We selected his presents then as I distracted the kids in another section of the store Maciek sneakily made the purchases, and even had them gift wrapped, which was a bonus as it meant I didn’t have to look around for sticky tape and wrapping paper!

Princess Funky Buns

He loves his new toys, and in the morning we went to the village bakery and bought some scrummy creamy cakes for the planned celebration, and tied some balloons to the tree outside.  The lady who owns the property (Alison) and her two sons joined us for a mini party of caramel popcorn, pretzels, Dora chocolate biscuits (hooray!) and jelly crocodiles, and of course the cakes and coffee! (chocolate filled profiteroles, eclairs and strawberry flans!)  We used a little sponge and custard cake in the shape of a pig for the two candles and all sang Happy Birthday to You!  He had a bit of trouble blowing the candles out as he’s only ever done it once before and of course we haven’t been practicing!

We saw these bikes a lot in Germany and Austria.  It teaches the kids to control the bike, balance and steer before worrying about pedaling.  As a result there were so many kids no older than 3 riding proper bikes with pedals, no problem.  Not a stabilizer in sight!

Just for laughs:  Amelia has three invisible friends – Rosetta, Maydee, and I Love You.  She also tells me that when she’s older and has her own kids she’s going to call them Rapunzel, Shine, Glitter and Santa (Santa is the boy).  LOL!!!!

Also, thanks to everyone for the birthday messages on facebook, skype and emails.  It helped make Noah’s day extra special! xx

Boating in Brantome

In a French Country Garden….

emailing in the courtyard

Our cottage - Le Balcon

Stupidly we drove from our place in the mountains seven hours straight, no stops at all, to here in the south west of France in the region of the Dordogne. 

The Grubs

We were waiting for the kids to fall asleep and then planned to stop when they’d woken up.  But they didn’t sleep for 5 HOURS!!  So then we just thought we may as well keep going.  We could have stopped earlier, but we’d packed enough food and drink for the day and nobody needed a wee so we didn’t see a point!  The roads were good, no traffic, but with hindsight, it was dumb, as Maciek’s eyes were almost popping out of his head and he had a terrible headache once we arrived. 

We are staying at a place called Le Grezes, near the village of Tocane St Apres.  As Maciek said this place is lovely.  It’s a farmhouse and barn, a few hundred years old (now we’re in my neck of the woods – mountains shmountains!).  The cottage we are staying in used to be part of the stables attached to the barn and the whole place is full of French country charm and character.  The ceilings are slanted (and so are the floors – I placed my little round bottle of perfume on my very lady like dressing table only to watch it slide towards me!) and striped with original wood beams, and there’s a huge one in our bedroom over the door that leads to the balcony (even I have to duck!).   There is a grapevine winding around the balcony complete with unripe green grapes, and the pool is a few steps away.  There’s loads of space for the kids to run around amongst various fruit trees (to my horror Noah loves collecting the rotten apples that are strewn along the ground) and an area where we’ve being playing Boules in the evenings.  The lady that owns it is from the UK and has been here with her two sons for three years.  She’s lovely, and unlike other accommodation we’ve had, she has provided us with a kettle, a microwave AND a toaster!  Not to mention lots of other little luxuries like a wardrobe and bedside tables (matching set of course!) and a welcome pack of a baguette, jam, red wine and she also went to the trouble of putting some milk, bottled water, and orange juice in the fridge as well as tea and coffee in the kitchen, which was all EXTREMELY welcome after a 7 hour drive!

Milly's new bikini's

To date it is the best accommodation we’ve had (the last place had been decorated some 40 years ago and never been changed, and it was filthy – we had to buy the kids some crocs to wear inside as their feet were constantly black!)  We seem to be unable to find a balance though.  Whereas the last place was walking distance to a gorgeous village and many attractions, the actual accommodation was horrible, and I found myself counting down the ‘sleeps’ till we could leave!  And although this accommodation is awesome, it’s in the middle of nowhere so requires driving, even to the bakery in the morning.  Hopefully somewhere along the line we’ll get it right!  The nice thing is about this place is the peace and quiet.  Sitting outside in the evening, once the kids have stopped shouting and fighting in bed, it’s silent.  Except for that annoying donkey and the occasional mooooo……

The Chateux seen from the driveway

Royale with Cheese

Hi there, we have arrived in the south west of France and apart from our lovely accommodation, which Melanie will write about, there hasn’t been too much to write home about as yet. So I will write about our experience at the French McDonalds today.

This was only the second time we have had Maccas in Europe, we try to stay away from it because it’s crap. We were driving into another old town and there it was, the golden M.   It had a big playground and it was close to lunch time so we decided that rather than spend an hour looking around an old town for something to eat we’d just have it.

What is This???

The girl at the counter didn’t speak any English so with my best French I proceeded to order:

2 large big mac meals with fries, one with coke, one with water

2 happy meals with nuggets, with fries, I didn’t know how to order a juice so I asked for water

When the order came I had everything for us and 2 happy meal boxes with 2 small cokes, I tried to question the coke but just got a blank stare so I thought ‘that’s not a bad effort we’ll settle for the coke, the kids can drink mels water’.  When we open the happy meal boxes there were two hamburgers, no nuggets. Our kids don’t know hamburgers, they know nuggets. They don’t eat what they don’t know so they had to settle for just fries for lunch and a strange banana and strawberry milk thing that looks like yoghurt. They were happy with their toy though, which was some weird contraption which apparently belongs on the top of a pencil.  I on the other hand didn’t want to waste their burgers so I ate them which in turn resulted in us spending our time in the old town looking for a public toilet and fast.

Every time I eat McDonalds I say ‘never again’.  And again I said it today. The cool thing though about McDonald in France is, like John Travolta said in Pulp Fiction, you can get beer.  But it’s not some expensive extra.  You can get it as part of your Big Mac meal, instead of coke for example, how cool is that?

Maciek