We're home ... and I feel like I've been hit by a truck!

Friday, June 12, 2015

Hello!  We’re home!!

Dinner on Wednesday night was at the creperie next door to the Chateau d’Ermenonville, and it was great.  The bad news is that R didn’t have the camera with him (we’re in the midst of “airplane” mode so pieces all over the place.)  To start, we both had nice salade mixt – butter lettuce with wonderful tomatoes.  Then R had lamb shank with haricots verts (green beans) and had their wonderful chicken breast in a champagne sauce with mushrooms – it was great!  For dessert, (which neither of us needed!) R had a crepe with Grand Marnier that they set aflame right in front of him, and I had Dame Blanche (the U.S. equivalent of a hot fudge sundae).  R finished the meal with a glass of cognac.  Then back to the hotel.  I went to bed fairly early, and we were both up at 6.  Showered/bathed and were ready to leave about 7:30 a.m. for our 12:25 p.m. flight (we like to be early).  It was a good thing that we did, as it took some effort to find a gas station to fill up the car (lesson: fill up the night before!) and it also took forever to find exactly where to leave the rental car in Charles de Gaulle.  (Note:  It has ALWAYS been a chore to drop a car there, as signage is very bad, and if you don’t know what terminal you’re flying out of, you might as well forget it!  Fortunately, we did know – experience does help!)

A bit of a queue to check in, but no problems – except that United’s luggage belt had stopped working, and they were basically just piling up luggage on the side of the counter … did make us wonder if we would ever see it again!  Through the final security hurdle and to the gate.  For some reason, the plane had to be towed into the gate so it left about 1:15 minutes late.  Not totally full, and we had our first-row bulkhead seats, which were great.  Even though they had a huge selection of movies, there wasn’t much that I wanted to see.  So, I re-watched Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, and Enchanted and only one watching of Gardians of the Galaxy and we were there!

Have the TSA Pre-check is wonderful, as we were through customs and immigration in literally minutes.  Then, however, we had to get back into yet a new security line, which took about half an hour.  Tempers were beginning to fray, as we were over an hour late, but we were able to get to our Dulles gate in time for me to change into shorts and get a tuna sandwich and water for the plane.

We took off around the scheduled time, and this final flight is always difficult – seems to take forever!  Eight hours something to get from Paris to Washington, and then 5 hours to get from Washington to Phoenix!  Go figure?!  At any rate, the plane had DirecTV (for a fee, of course) but I paid the $7.99 anyway, and watched two Women’s World Cup games, so that was fine.  We landed a few minutes after 8 p.m.  Luggage was fairly quick coming, and it was all there, so out to the rental car bus and into our car by about 8:45 p.m.

We got home about 11:15 p.m. and boy, it was nice to pull into the driveway.  As Robert says, it is nice to travel, but it is also nice to get home after a long trip!  Things in the process of getting sorted, and of course, I have laundry going even as I type!  We had a truly wonderful trip!  It was SO nice seeing old friends again (Graciela, Alain, Nathalie, Nathan & Julia) as well as meeting new ones (Pascal & Tina!)

Thank you all for joining us, and hopefully we’ll see you on our next adventure, if not before!

Love to all!

m

xxx

Back in France, and "in position!"

Tuesday evening, June 9, 2015

Hallo!

Well, we actually had a lovely dinner tonight here in Brugge.  We went out about 7 p.m. and weren’t really able to get any good suggestions from our hotel owner, as everything she thought of apparently is closed tonight!  (When we asked her if it was usual for restaurants to close on Tuesday nights, she replied that no, it was usually Wednesday nights!)  So!  We headed out toward the more non-touristy part of Brugge.  I was determined that we were NOT going to eat in any place around the Market square, where we would be surrounded by everybody speaking English!  We retraced our route to the boat ride this morning, but R didn’t really like the look of Mozarthuis (where I had hot chocolate and he had tea) for dinner.  Across the courtyard was the hotel and restaurant of the Duc de Boulogne, which looked fairly interesting. 

R's gray shrimp salad

My Belgian white asparagus

Lovely room overlooking the canal on two sides!

R was still up for looking a bit more, but I basically said I had about 5 more minutes left in my standing-out-in-the-cold time.  So, we went back and took another look at the hotel’s restaurant, and decided this was the place.  We hadn’t reserved, but we were a bit early, and fortunately, they had room for us.  They showed us to one riverside table, but the sun was too hot (I know, I can’t make up my mind) shining in on me, so we moved to a less sunny table, still by the water’s edge.  We both decided to take the “menu” – starter, main course and dessert.  R took the grey shrimp salad for starters, with the duck breast for his main course, followed, (of course!) by fruit salad and sorbet.  I started with their Belgian white asparagus with chopped hard boiled egg and butter sauce, followed by their rib steak cooked perfectly that came with a potato pancake, several roasted potatoes, and a small ramekin of very nicely cooked veggies in a cheese sauce. 

R's duck breast

My steak

We both enjoyed our meals very, very much!  For dessert, R had the fruit salad with peach sorbet, and I had Dame Blanche – which was two scoops of vanilla ice cream, with a dark chocolate sauce poured over it, followed by a large dollop of their home-made whipped cream…YUM!  We had a bottle of their red house wine, a Grenache/Merlot blend, which was excellent.  The dining room was really beautiful, with windows overlooking canals on two sides, and it was SO nice and warm … we had a really lovely dinner! 

Tomorrow morning, will find us packing up and heading back to France to Chateau d’Ermenonville, near Aeroport Charles de Gaulle.  We’re still not sure how we’re getting there – I am thinking possibly through Compiegne (where Germany surrendered after WWI, and where Hitler made France surrender in WWII) but we’ll see! 

More later!

m

xxx

Bonjour, we are back in France!

In fact, as R likes to put it, we are “in position” for tomorrow’s travel home.  This morning, we were up at our usual time, and ready to go by breakfast time of 8:30 a.m.  It really felt like the wind had died down, which is good, and it was also a bit warmer.  It took two trips to get everything into the car, but it still fits, which is the main thing.  Lovely breakfast again, and out on the road about 9 a.m.  As it turned out, Robert wanted me to turn left immediately upon exiting the parking area, but guess what?  They are digging up the road! 

R's fruit salad with peach sorbet

My "Dame Blanche" with real whipped cream!

(Hard to go where there are no more cobbles…) So, a much more complicated route out of town, but eventually we made it.  We have both decided that Brugge is truly a lovely small city, and there is much more to explore than we were able to get to in only a day and a half.  So … shall we say, next time?!

We would through some very small and uncrowded roads heading back into France, and in fact, took until lunch time to even make it close to the border.  I had Robert take some pictures of some of the road signs, to possibly explain some of my confusion.  When there are no recognizable words or pictures, it can get a bit dicey occasionally!  And we honestly had no idea if these were important words, or town names, or what!  I did finally come to recognize that when a white line ends with a red rectangle, that means the road is cut off and you can’t get through…who says I can’t learn symbology?

Another shot of Brugge!

We did stop for a quick lunch at a Carrefour, and decided to head directly to Ermenonville via the peage (tollway), and made it to le Chateau d’Ermenonville just on 2 p.m. 

A town?

At any rate...

We did like the green cow!

As our room reportedly wasn’t ready yet, we deposited our luggage and decided to make a trial run to Charles de Gaulle airport.  (We have stayed many times at the chateau for airport convenience, but with all the building that has been going on, we wanted to be sure we could still find it!)  It took about 20 minutes to get there, but what we had forgotten to find out was which terminal United Airlines flies from – and that is critical at de Gaulle.  We had an interesting time finding out how to exit CDG – there is an incredible amount of signage all over the place, and lots and lots of dead ends or gated entries.  Finally found our way back to the hotel about 3 p.m. and picked up our keys to room #301.  We have never stayed in this wing of the hotel before. 

These crowded Belgian roads...

(We have probably stayed here 10 – 12 times over the years, and have even had their tower suite once, which was wonderful!) 

I love our bedroom!

View out the other side of our room

Chateau from the front

But 301 sits all by itself at the end of one of the buildings, and it is really much larger than many of their rooms.  We also have a lovely working area and desk, with views over the courtyard in one direction, and over the moat and the woods from the other!  We have opened the windows and the cross breeze is wonderful – and I’m also back in shorts, which is nice.

A statue in Ermenonville

Another front view

Me in the back of the chateau

Cute red pergola!

So…I reorganized luggage (paying special attention to all liquids and things that cannot go into carry-on luggage), and R got the computer up and running.  I checked us in on-line, and R went down with the flash drive and now we have our boarding passes as well!  Neat!  We then walked a bit through town – it’s very small, and there’s not much too it from a commercial point of view, but we did find two restaurants just outside the gates for dinner.  They do have a lovely restaurant here, but their menus are either 45€ or 50€ each, or you can order a la carte … and with the meat choices being lamb, veal or pigeon, let us only say, I’ll stay in and eat chocolate!  We then walked down the property to a wonderful old, colorful gazebo, which I always like to do.  Then back, as R wanting a sit down, and I wanted to blog!

So!  Dear friends, we are now getting ready for the Paris/Washington Dulles/Phoenix trip tomorrow.  Take care, and I will definitely include tonight’s dinner at some point!

Lots of love,

m

xxx

A two-museum kind of day!

Tuesday, June 09, 2015

Hallo!  (I am told that that’s Dutch for “hello!”)

We went out for a walk last night (although no dinner, as we were SO over-stuffed from our wonderful lunch!) and it was SOOOOOOO cold and blustery outside!  [Margaret seems to have forgotten how hot it was in Rome.  Some people are never satisfied. – R]  I was wishing I had my winter hat and cold-weather gloves and definitely my cashmere sweater to keep me warm.  Fortunately, my coat is pretty warm, and I was wearing a scarf, which helped a bit.  We did some strolling through town and then found some canals to walk along.  Brugge is truly a beautiful little city!  We were in about 9:30 p.m. (and of course it doesn’t even get dark until 10:30 p.m. or so…)

View from our window!

Beautiful but COLD in the sunshine!

I love the canals!

It was so nice and quiet in the hotel last night; very peaceful.  And this morning I availed myself of our lovely bathtub for a wonderful soak…Breakfast started at 8:30 a.m. and was very good.  Freshly squeezed orange juice, a variety of cheese and cold meats, as well as eggs on offer … and anywhere that I can have a slice of pound cake and paint it with Nutella – breakfast doesn’t get much better than that!  We then had a bit of a rest, as it seems that NOTHING opens up here before 10 a.m.  So…we were out a few minutes to 10, and headed down the street from our hotel, and over the bridge, and then along the canal until we came to a small booth selling tickets for the boat!  Very easy; 8€ each, and we got in line.

If I look cold, it's because I am!

So lovely...

Beautiful houses and so well kept!

Me with eyes closed on boat...

Cygnets are so cute!

Love the architecture!

And the bridges...

In just a few minutes our boat pulled up, and on we got.  The boats say they can hold 40 passengers, but I think that would be a really tight squeeze…although as it’s still very cold and windy (albeit sunny), I think we were actually huddling together for warmth!  Our boat driver gave the tour in three languages – Dutch, French and English, and R said he also said things in German, which I can’t confirm.  We did a neat circuit of some of the canals; some of the houses are so beautiful, and there were two swans that we saw with six sort of middle-school-size cygnets; SO cute!  The tour only took half an hour or so, but I was completely frozen by the time we got back.  R, ever thoughtful, suggested hot chocolate at the closest place – Mozarthuis, so in we went.  I ordered mine with “whipped cream” – and unlike in the U.S. where out comes the can, this was REAL cream in a small bowl – and it was YUMMY!  (No calories there, of course…) 

From there, we decided to head to the Diamond Museum – and this was actually R’s choice, as he was interested in the polishing demonstration that they do every day at 12:15 p.m. 

Hot chocolate with real cream to warm me up!

It seems that the first diamond polisher was from Brugge, and that in the 1400’s, Brugge was an international center for diamonds and polishing.  The museum was fascinating – although they had one panel playing the Diamonds are Forever James Bond theme song over and over, and of course I can’t get it out of my head…We learned about diamonds, and cutting and faceting and finishing, and followed the progress of the Lesotho Promise, a massive diamond weighing 603 carats as it was split into 26 stones. 

Diamond polishing equipment

An expert at work!

Truly absolutely stunning.  The polishing demonstration was fascinating – and given simultaneously once again in three languages.  This truly is an international city!  Unfortunately, they did not give out samples at the end…I did ask…

As it was now lunch time, and we were determined to eat a light lunch so we could have dinner tonight, we found a noodle place right down the street from the diamond museum.  I had a bowl of noodles with beef, and R had a bowl with shrimp. 

Me with beef bowl

R with shrimp bowl

As R commented, on a cold day like today, warm is definitely a good thing!  From there, we did a bit of shopping.  Between the places selling lace and all the chocolate shops, you literally can’t walk five feet without hitting one or the other or both. 

I picked a place called Depla because it looked nice and interesting, and they make their own chocolate right on the premises.  (Apparently, from what we have read, the Belgians insist that their chocolate be FRESH and can tell if it is more than a day old!  I’m not even sure how that’s possible.)  Their chocolates are really beautiful, and if/when we open the box, I’m not sure how long it will take us to devour everything.  So far, that box is sealed…

From there, we headed toward the museum I wanted to visit today – the Chocolate museum, which was on the other side of the main market square.  On the way, we stopped at Sfeer, an antique shop that we had looked at yesterday.  They have some wonderful things, and neither of us can resist cut glass for very long.  At any rate, a beautiful blue decanter with six crystal and blue goblets, as well as a second, rather Art Deco decanter will now be heading their way to Tucson in the very near future.  The shipping wasn’t too bad at all – it’s rather like the U.S. and France – if it fits, it ships! 

Our two new decanters with glasses!

The man in the shop weighed everything carefully, and suggested that we might want to take the two stoppers with us, so that they could use more packing material in the box…sounded good to us.  They should arrive somewhere in the next 14 days!

Now that we were fully laden with chocolate and wine stoppers and a few other odds and ends, we finally made it to the chocolate museum.  This basically showed the process of how chocolate got started – with the Mayans and Aztecs harvesting the beans, and showing the Spanish when they arrived.  Little by little, this very expensive luxury worked its way to Europe and the Royal Houses and became a real hit!  At this point, it was basically in the form of hot chocolate.  It took some real inventors to add sugar to it and then make it into the form of chocolate that we know today.  We learned about cocoa solids and powders and creams – and what an intense process it is before it ever even leaves its home country, let alone gets to the grocery store in the form of Yorkie Bars!  Very, very interesting, and of course, it ended with a demonstration by a young man making some pralines that were really delicious!  See, if the chocolate museum can have samples, why can’t the diamond museum?? 

By this point, it was after 4 p.m. and we decided to head back to the hotel for a lie down before dinner.  (Also, so I could write this blog!)  Brugge is truly such a beautiful place, I would love to come back here when the weather is better.  (Even winter wouldn’t be so bad, as long as the wind wasn’t blowing.  It’s a virtual gale coming off the North Sea, and wow, that wind makes it awful!  And there are tourists here in shorts and sandals – I’m sure because that’s all they brought…)  So, will close for now!

Lots of love,

m

xxx