We made it to Rennes and began exploring this week. The streets are very beautiful with lots of interesting old buildings. The leaning buildings (photo above) in a city square from about 1500 are literally only standing because the others are holding them up. Check out the two in the middle. There were much newer
After a week here in Angers, we can easily say that we really like it. Angers is a medium-sized city, with an incredible castle that would have been a formidable fortress to discourage potential invaders when it was built in the 9th century and expanded to its current size in the 13th century. The city
We arrived in Angers, France on Saturday evening after some minor train delays and schlepping of the bike and bags from Orléans. We’re staying in a small apartment built recently in the rear of the courtyard of an house built in the 1800s along a quiet street in the city center. Angers has been voted
We’re in the final couple of days in Orléans and packing up to go to Angers (pronounced Ahn-jzay) on Saturday. We’re saying goodbye to our favorite bakeries and trying to figure out how to get all of the belongings we’ve distributed around the apartment back into our bags. We’ve put most of our stuff in storage
One down, eleven months to go on our one-year visa! We’ve learned so much in this first month, and yet we feel that we have so much more to learn to determine where we might want to stay a while. We had a strategy when we got here and it’s still the strategy, but being
The rental car saga finally came to a quiet end on Friday (read the Day 1 and Day 2 posts if you haven’t already) after we took the train back to Blois to return the car keys and try to solve the issue of returning a car to a different facility than the one we
We’re now three weeks into our year in France and our stay in Orléans. Adventures always bring unexpected learning experiences and gratitude to our lives. Here are some things that we’ve learned about during our stay in France that have been less than ideal: These are really small things though, things to experience and navigate
We visited the Saturday Market again today, with the intention of actually buying things to make to eat. What a haul we made! Right away, I used the English cucumber, tomatoes, kalamata olives, and some of the feta we bought for a salad, with some vinaigrette dressing I bought at the grocery store. Everything was
We’ve been to the same bakery (“Maison Ayrole Maureille”) a few blocks away from our apartment for four days in a row now, trying various pastries, a baguette, small pizzettes with ham and cheese, and a sandwich with ham, tiny pickles, and butter. I’m starting to get embarrassed! But what has me literally dreaming about
Photo from the inside of Cathedral Sainte-Croix d’Orléans, which dates back to 1288. It’s been partially destroyed and rebuilt a number of times. It’s been a busy first week here in Orléans, France. We had several critical to-dos that needed to take place this week to set us up for success in the coming year,