The New Year has arrived and with it, a chance to look back at the exciting Christmas week holiday we spent with one of our children who came to visit us in Angers. It was a fun week and we kept busy, despite it being bitterly cold and each of us getting mildly sick with colds throughout the week.

We made the most of our time with visits to the city of Nantes, which is to the west of Angers near the Atlantic coast of France, and to Paris for a couple of days before our daughter headed back home.

We toured three gorgeous chateaus this week and learned about their roles in local and regional history: Chateau de Brissac, Chateau des Ducs de Bretagne, and Angers Chateau.

We also visited four very different museums spanning art, history, and giant mechanized creatures: Les Machines de L’île, The Nantes History Museum, Angers Museum of Fine Arts, and Collegiale Saint-Martin Museum. The mechanical spider shown above was amazing, and we were asked to volunteer to work the mechanisms and add our own sound effects for a couple of birds for the crowd. They were big on involving the audience!

We enjoyed visiting many of the hot spots in Paris: the Eiffel Tower, Notre Dame Cathedral, the courtyard of the Louvre museum, the Arc de Triumph, and the Luxembourg Palace gardens. We also took a river cruise on the Seine which was fortunately in a warm enclosed boat. Most of our time was spent outside as we explored, as we wanted to show our daughter as many great things as possible. And she was amazed by all that she saw and experienced in her first visit to Europe.

We also shared some of our favorite things about Angers with her throughout the week:

• Christmas markets
• The local Saturday morning farmer’s market
• A variety of delicious breads and pastries from our favorite bakeries
• Miraculous French hot chocolate with the consistency of warm pudding
• Crepes!
• Drives and train trips through the beautiful French countryside
• Walks through very old neighborhoods, looking at beautiful old architecture and churches

It was a really nice week, and it was wonderful to spend it together. Greg and I also got to have some more new-to-us French cultural experiences, which we’ve been missing somewhat the last few months as we’ve been busy pursuing our language and driving lessons.

We’ve got some travel plans in process for the next few months here and are looking forward to more new adventures, including a trip to Italy. Looking forward to sharing more as we go!

Wishing you and yours a healthy and happy New Year!