 Remy wearing Karol's glasses, hmm, looking good |  Dion showing the love |
Our last breakfast in Prague is a kind of farewell to the city and to the boys who are about to get on a train to Berlin to stay for a week while Karol and I are getting a short flight to France. We'll all re unite in Paris for our last week of holidays. Wow so far so good. Time now for the boys to uncover the grunge and art of Berlin on their own terms. They'll be staying in a youth hostel and being on their own for the first time OS.
Touch down Charles De Gaul
Touch down in France is something special for Karol and I. We last did it on our honeymoon 26 years before. Before our boys were born, our house bought, our debts amassed, our dreams put on hold and replaced by other ones, for a short while at least. We were also now in a country without a translator, with virtually no language skills of our own and where the cars drive on the opposite side of the road. The last one was what I was worried about. We picked up a beautiful new Citroen 5 with GPS guidance, plugged in our address to Tourny in the Normandy region and in a state of complete angst set off. My mantra was “keep to the right, keep to the right” - where was my helpful Jiri now? At least I had that one day in Bohemia with him by my side to get used to an inversion of 30 years of driving habit!
We arrived in the late summer afternoon, in one piece, phew. Tourny is a small town with winding lane ways edged with tall mud brick fences. Our bed and breakfast or “Chambre d’hote” is behind one of these on the edge of town next to fields of wheat and orchards of apple trees. Our host is an adorable local lady, Laurance. After she showed us to our room, we sat outside with a bottle of her best local red and a simple fare of pizza and salad she quickly whipped up - perfect. Here are some pics..
We arrived in the late summer afternoon, in one piece, phew. Tourny is a small town with winding lane ways edged with tall mud brick fences. Our bed and breakfast or “Chambre d’hote” is behind one of these on the edge of town next to fields of wheat and orchards of apple trees. Our host is an adorable local lady, Laurance. After she showed us to our room, we sat outside with a bottle of her best local red and a simple fare of pizza and salad she quickly whipped up - perfect. Here are some pics..
wheat field on the edge of Tourny, France
Her country style house has been elegantly and imaginatively decorated in every detail. There’s a touch of French provincial, layered over with shabby sheek, Parisienne elegance and the whimsy of collectables and the cunning of a film set. Our room is a converted attic with dormer windows left and right so we have a lovely cross breeze. The toilet closet has white flock wall paper and a series of 5 small Monet postcards made to look like gilded framed miniatures hanging off little hooks. The bath and wash basin are divided off from the rest of the room by a short Romanesque balustrade with sheer lace curtains partly hiding the bath. All very cute - makes me smile it does. Sister Chris would love this room. I kept on saying how much she would love this place. It’s love of all things decorative, rustic and edible! Funnily I had been doing the same thing in Prague but raving to Karol that sister Linda would die of happiness in the Hotel Paris with it’s touches of 40’s Hollywood glamour in the deco furnishings and massive interiors. There were even a series of black and white film stills from that Hollywood era along one corridor next to the foyer - were those films shot in the Hotel? Could have.
Laurance gave us some easy directions for an afternoon walk, a ‘bon circuit’ I think she said - a big loop that took us from our edge of town, along the wheat field, through the quiet empty lane ways of Tourny and past the old crumbling Gothic Church. It is still in use and I could see up in the roof with an open window that the pigeons use it too. Karol and I decided that this small town should be called a village because as the sun was setting we could hear a long empty stillness and smell the sweet dirty smell of chicken shit and the dank smell of flour coming from the wheat fields. We slept deeply relaxed that night. We were now well away from the hectic all night energy of Prague and listening to nothing. A small breeze moved through our attic ‘Chambre d’hote’. Here are some pics..
Laurance gave us some easy directions for an afternoon walk, a ‘bon circuit’ I think she said - a big loop that took us from our edge of town, along the wheat field, through the quiet empty lane ways of Tourny and past the old crumbling Gothic Church. It is still in use and I could see up in the roof with an open window that the pigeons use it too. Karol and I decided that this small town should be called a village because as the sun was setting we could hear a long empty stillness and smell the sweet dirty smell of chicken shit and the dank smell of flour coming from the wheat fields. We slept deeply relaxed that night. We were now well away from the hectic all night energy of Prague and listening to nothing. A small breeze moved through our attic ‘Chambre d’hote’. Here are some pics..