Preganziol & Bolzano

Hi,

Last night Kay & I tried to download her photos but couldn't work it out. So I am going to try emailing something to a few of you. You just type in some details & it lets you see the 4 photos.

Anyway, After the day in Venice I took a day off yesterday! Spent the morning writing my diary & postcards. Kay was home for a few hours over lunch which was nice. I then took a train to the next station & wandered around Mogliano for a few hours. It's a bit bigger than Preganziol, & I even bought your birthday present, Dad! Then I learned how to waste an hour of my life.

Asked directions to the Post Office at the tourist bureau. Followed what she said but didn't find it, so looked around & stumbled acroos it. had not realised she has the same disease as Jen & Gayelene. When they give me directions I automatically reverse left & right now.

It was a big & busy PO, & after watching a few others I realised you had to get a ticket, which was in itself an experience, since you need to first indicate the sort of service you want. Thought it was safe to go for the picture of a letter as I only wanted stamps, & I could see the words "pension" & "business" on some of the other options. Well, there was only one person working letters, & it took an hour before my number came up on the screen. So after practicing the word for 8 & figuring I could gesture at the space left for stamps, I "asked" for that. At which point she shook her head & said "piccolo" a few times, which I took to mean the space was too small for the stamps. Confirmed when she showed me the 10x2cm franked stamps required!!! So we considered envelopes, but I would have had to address them & then she obviously had to weigh them before giving me the damn franks. Since I had envelopes in my backpack & could not be bothered addressing 8 then & there, I left with nothing! Except & dose of frustration, & the wish that I had asked Kay about buying stamps before attempting to do so. oh well...

last night we ate out with a friend of Kay's at a local pizza restaurant. It stormed, complete with lightning, for most of the night, which I think cooled things down today!

This morning kay left at 5am for a holiday down south with a friend for 5 days. I did not get up, but said my goodbyes last night! Daniel returns from Brussells tomorrow night, & they have kindly let me stay here on a night that neither of them are home. Today I caught the train up to Bolzano in the north of Italy to see Otzi, the 5000 year old mummy found in the Italian/Austrain Alps. Have just realised that I travelled for a total of 9 hours and was only there for 3! But the 5 hours there & 4 hours back were quite spectacular in terms of scenery as it took us through the Dolomites. The train goes along the floor of the valley & the mountains rise up on both sides. It's very geen at the moment, and there are grape vines all along the way, interspersed with olive trees further north. Towns intermittently come into view, sometimes crawling up the lower slopes with a backdrop of cliffs. And occasionally the vineyards climb over small hills, looking like patchwork blankets have been draped over the top. I even saw a few castles!

I had a book & read quite a bit in 9 hours, but kept getting distracted by the view!

Otzi & the museum are in a very unassuming little town. It's more german than italian. Fortunately there was an audioguide in English. It was amazing to see him & all of the artifacts they found with him - his clothing, arrows, bow, everything! There were even a few maple elaves he used to wrap embers in. Must say I was most impressed by his shoes. 5000 year old grass is still stuffing his leather uppers, complete with rope mesh to hold it in. Everything is kept in glass display cases at 6 degrees below zero. The museum also has many other things from the bronze age, and zillions of annoying school children who ran around madly making a lot of noise.

Have booked my ticket to Geneva tomorrow so it will be another 8 hours on the train.

Must go & pack!

luv, Bella xxx
I wonder what my Swiss name will be?

Preganziol

Hello all,

I arrived near Venice on the train on Saturday morning & met Kay at the station, in the McDonalds since it was airconditioned! It's a bit of pot luck whether the train you get is air conditioned or not when you ride the local ones. Some are new, two storey & very cool, & some are older with only windows & you need to fan yourself when it stops at stations! From Ravenna it was about 3 hours with only one change in Ferrara. There was a bit of a wait so the trip itself wasn't that long.

Kay & Daniel live in a lovely house in a quiet street, & only a few hundred metres from the local train station. It's 3 storeys with 4 bedrooms. I am downstairs in the basement, next to what I call the Banquet Hall. It's a huge room with a bar, fireplace & table etc! I quite like being downstairs as it's a few degrees cooler than upstairs & the heat has been quite oppressive in the last few days.

Kay has planted a vegetable garden & lots of flowers around the place, which are all in bloom at the moment. They also have 3 cats who roam around! I thought I'd lost one the other day, but apparently she goes visiting and returns when she likes.

Saturday afternoon we had lunch out, came back & put my luggage in & then went to Treviso. It's an old walled city with a system of canals underneath. I think it is known as Little Venice, but there are some roads/cars as well. There are (of course) lots of narrow streets, but this town had 5 or 6 waterwheels which was new!

Sunday they took me for a drive to Aloso & Bessamo del Grappa (I think!). Aloso is a town on a hilltop & there's the walls of a castle on the summit - that we climbed to see in ridiculous heat! Worth it though for the fabulous 360 degree view of mountains, green valleys with vineyards etc.

You cross a bridge to get into Bessamo & we had a wander & a fabulous gelato! I have eaten many in the last few days. These two towns are the first that I had seen the effects of war. In Treviso there's a building that was bombed & while it has been rebuilt, they have left the jagged darker line to indicate the level it was at after the war. Bessamo had several walls where there are bullet holes in the external plaster. Weird to see.

On Monday, as I said in the last blog, I had a slow morning & ended up going back to Treviso to have a better look around. had a map & a walking path from the tourist Office & it was great to just see it on foot. Came home after 4 or 5 hours, ratted through their fridge & cupboards, & cooked dinner for Kay & I (Daniel jetted off to work in Brussels for a few days that morning) which she was quite thrilled about when she got home at 8.30!

Yesterday I spent the day in Venice. Actually, the day & the evening! Was out for 15 hours & am really quite exhausted even this morning! Had a wonderful day with Sylvie & some of her friends. We visited the Glass Factory which was interesting. They store the glass in what is called the Library, & strangely it looks just like that! They make the glass in rectangles that are broken into 2 squares, which they then "file" on shelves all around the walls! They make about 3000 colours. Fortunately I did not feel the need to purchase & send any home, as a) I don't think I can buy before I know what I want to make & b) they have a distributor in Melbourne!

After this we had lunch & went to a bagshop of an apparently famous italian designer who Sylvie knew of. This was an experience in itself! They offer you water or coffee & were very nice, but the bags were a tad out of my price range! I'm talking 500 - 1200 euros or roughly $700 - 2000. For a handbag!!! Beautiful as they were, I was quite happy to simply look at them.

I left the others for a few hours to go shopping (some of you will be very happy with my purchases!) & then I was lucky enough to be able to go to their apartment & take a quick shower before dinner. They ended up with a late booking so I said goodbye & ate on my own, caught a vaporetto (water equivalent of a bus) back to the station & then a train here. Got in at 10.45pm after it had taken me nearly two hours just to get from the restaurant home! Anyway, it was great.

I might get my act together & go to Verona this afternoon. Tomorrow I am going to Bolzano to see Otzi the Iceman & then Friday I will head to Geneva.

That's about all! Kay has taken a few photos that we will try to put on here, however she is heading off for 5 days holiday tomorrow morning so we may not have time. I guess you'll find out!

Luv,

Belle xxx

Preganziol

Hello! A short blog now & a long blog later, but for those who didn't know the Van Gogh painting I spoke of in Arles, here's a link to a picture of it!
http://www.isabel.com/gallery/reprofr/v/vangogh/om308.html
Am staying with Kay & Daniel just outside of Venice for a few days. On a map you'll probably see Treviso, & this is one train stop closer to Venice!

See ya

Belle xxx

Ravenna (last day)

Well today we finished the course in the early afternoon. It has been an amazing week. Cost a small fortune to post things home but I am definitely not carting 2 mosaics, a hammer & 2 chisels around with me! Took the opportunity to add in a couple of books & a few of the souvenirs I've bought to lighten my pack.

I am meeting Sylvie in Venice on Tuesday for a tour of the smalti (glass used in the mosaics) factory, arranged in about 5 seconds by Luciana. Will catch a train to Treviso where Kay & Daniel live tomorrow morning.

Ravenna is a lovely town, small enough to walk most places. The mosaics we saw on our little tour yesterday were wonderful. I felt like I'd seen a lot of them since there are postcards everywhere! One of the interesting things I found out is that Ravenna sits on water table, so every house has a "raised floor". Nowadays they pump the water out to keep the level right, but in the past they just used to cover the floor with rubble, raise the level & build a new floor! One church has almost 3 metres difference between the 6th & 16th century floor levels.

When excavating behind a church for a carpark, a mosaic was found. But they just kept finding more, and all in all there were nine levels of mosiacs, one on top of the other! They call the building The House of the Stone Carpets since this is literally what it looks like, & of course that was essentially the purpose thet served anyway. Only one level is on display - the others are displayed in some museum.

Our guide, Sylvia was great. She has studied the symbology of mosaics, invcluding her thesis on the symbology of the jewels in a particularly famous mosaic portrait! But it helped to understand the what & why of the things we were seeing.

Anyway, that's about all for now. The weather is hot & I am not complaining exactly, but it's really really really hot!!!

Ciao for now,
Bella ( my Italian name of course!) xxx

Ravenna... still!

Hi all,

Well we are half way through day 4 of the course & it's speeding by very quickly. Have finished both of my mosaics, although the first one needs to have the cheesecloth taken of with boiling water tomorrow. Today we did our modern mosaic in a few hours. Much simpler process - put cement that dries in a couple of hours directly into a frame, transfer your design & work like mad to finish before the cement sets! You just put the pieces straight into the cement. Quicker but once a piece is in, it's pretty much in!

The other people in the course are mostly nice. There's an aunt & niece who keep a bit to themselves as they are on a kind of bonding trip. There's the OT who talks ALL THE TIME about things nobody else cares about. She gives details of everything her daughters, son etc do & don't do, info about their husbands etc. And always has a story to equal or better anything somebody says! She seems to have pissed off all 4 of us already. A clean sweep.

Lastly there's Sylvie, a doctor from New York who I have teamed up with a bit. We have had dinner together a few nights & went to a jazz concert last night. The Ravenna Festival is on so there's things to do at night. Hostel curfew is 11.30pm though, so I have to be careful not to be locked out! Tonight we are meeting the computer man from the course at a ceramics exhibition & having drinks with him & some of his friends.

The people running the course are amazing. Very passionate about what they do. Luciana is the boss & can speak English, but gets so excited talking about mosaics she reverts to Italian & Analisa had to translate! Ana helps teach but is also the translator. She's also a great source of local information & likes collecting expressions from other countries. I have taught her "off like a bucket of prawns in the sun".

Brunetta is just that & Sylvie & I can't work out how someone can look so elegant making mosaics! She's an amazing artisan (NOT an artist) & watching her work is quite fascinating. Then there's Luca who's a dogsbody really. He'll cut tiles for us, prepare the cement/binder/glue etc but he also works on their mosaics.

Last night there was a new girl in my dorm, who is here updating the Let's Go Travel Guide for the US. I spoke to her about the course & she came with me this morning to speak to them "for 5 minutes" - but of course they're italian & she left about 45 minutes later.

We go on a tour of the Basilicas etc this afternoon to see all of the mosaics. I am able to stay at the hostel on Friday night as well so will head to Venice Saturday. Until then, ciao.

PS Happy Birthday again for yesterday, Penny!!!

Luv,

Belle xxx

Ravenna

Well we are up to the second day of the workshop & half way through our first piece! The people are lovely & it's a wroking studio as well as a teaching studio. So we watch in awe as they put together massive replicas of mosaics while we struggle to cut our tesserae! It's a completely different method than the one Gayelene & I learned so I'll briefly try to describe it.

You trace a pattern of a mosaic tile for tile onto tracing paper, then turn it over & REDO each tile in watersoluble pen.

Then a bed of lime in prepared on a support board. It's a thick paste than doesn't move or slide when you put the board vertically. The tracing in watersoluble pen is laid over the lime, & the design transfers on! You leave it overnight so the ink is absorbed into the lime.

Then you place the tesserae into the lime (I'll tell you how we cut in a minute) which holds them in place. The lime takes weeks to dry porperly so you can remove them if necessary, & just cover the whole thing overnight with pastic. I think what happens when this stage is done is that cheesecloth with a special glue is placed over the top of the whole piece & when it's dry it's strong enough to hold the whole lot until you put it into cement. Then the glue dissolves in water & hey presto, the job's done.

We are only allowed to cut using the ancient tools of a double bladed hammer type thing & a fat chisel embedded into the end of a log, which you pace between your knees. No nippers allowed Gayelene!!! We use glass, made in Venice, that comes in what they call a pizza, since that's exactly what it looks like, & marble or stone. Sitting chopping the way we do, it's easy to imagine what it was like back in those days, & I think there's the distinct possibility I was a Roman slave in a former life. They were the ones to cut the tiles!

Our teachers are Luciana, Brunetta, Analisa, Manuela, Marco & Luco - not a word of a lie! They are very passionate about the whole thing & make it look so easy.

PS my creidt card has been found!

Belle xxx

Ravenna

Firstly, apologies - dont quite know what happened but I'd blogged Saturday morning & somehow it wasn't published: Can be hard to understand instructions in another language. HOpe I've worked it out, despite being late now.

Anyway,
I have made it to Ravenna without any problems on the train(s) & started the course this morning. Only 5 of us & tho thers are all American. Including an OT would you believe it? Will write more soon, but am enjoying it so far. The hostels great & I will have a dorm to myself for a few night I think!

Bye

Luv Belle xxx

Chambéry again

Hi all,
to allay your fears before going into all the details, I have been able to book my train ticket to Bologna tomorrow as there are no seats today! From there it should be easy to get the local train to Ravenna.

But back a few days...

the last time I wrote I was in Arles & had met Kathryn, an Australian from Sydney. After we left the Internet Cafe we went for dinner & ended up having it in Le Café de la Nuit (Cafe of the Night), the one immortalised by Van Gogh in a painting of the same name! For those who might be familiar with the painting, the Cafe is bright yellow on the left hand side, with black iron scrolls on the wall, & there are stars in a blue-black sky. As we were sitting there I looked up & realised why it was in the Place de Forum. If you imagine a roman structure that is 2 marble pylons with a triangle on the top, with writing between the pylons, & then break that in half from top to bottom (go on - try!) then this was embedded in the front wall of a hotel opposite! It was a bizarre but amazing way to preserve it! I had walked through this Place earlier in the day but not noticed it, which will teach me for not turning around. You should always look behind you as well!

Both Kathryn & I wanted to go to a bird park nearby in The Camargue so I picked her up the next morning & went together. My hope was to see Flamingoes, & there were thousands of them. We spent ages watching them & their interesting group dynamics! eg when a group is feeding, others must reckon there's pretty good food there so want to join in. So they fly in pretty much head first under the water & bash into the rest of the group! I called it "scrumming" since head down, bum up, that's what it looked like they were doing. We also saw animals whose name I can't remember but they were basically Big Rats. The size of a cat, with a rat like tail & beaver like front, they were very cute. Swam well too. The Park has 6 or 7km of walking tracks that take you around the swamps so it was a full morning into the early afternoon. We also got to see a few of the fairly famous white Camargue horses.

We drove down to St-Marie-sur-la-Mer, to have a quick look at the beach & an ice-cream, then left & went to a perfume Museum. I dropped Kathryn back into Arles before driving towards St-Remy-de-Provence & finding a B&B for the night. Jumping into that pool was fantastic after all that walking. Danielle, at 7pm that night I was sitting in a café in Eygalières nearby the B&B. I promised to let you know what I was doing!

Thursday was an amazing day that will stick in my mind forever. I went firstly to a lavender museum near a town called Gordes & then up to Orange, where I'd seen a pamphlet on their amphitheatre, saying it was a pretty special one. Now I realise I've said I was a little disappointed in some of the ruins, but maybe that was all in preparation for this one! I hadn't realised that apart from the semicircle of amphitheatres, there was also a stage wall that closed the gap by going straight across the theatre. Mostly these have disappeared & there are only a few pillars & crumbling blocks to show for it. Well; Orange is one of only 3 places in the world, & the only place in Europe, that has a complete stage wall still standing. The others are in Syria & Turkey. 38 m high & over 100m long, it brought me to tears when I walked in & saw it! So I guess I was impressed with this one... I spent about 3 or 4 hours exploring it with the audioguide, took a whole roll of film which you will all be bored by no doubt in the future, & had lunch on the steps staring at that wall. It had obviously been a few storeys high & a 3.5m statue of Augustus has been restored into a niche high up. The amphitheatre has had a checkered history, being used as a prison & also having a whole town built inside at different stages. This was all removed to take it back to how it originally looked. Now they have lots of opera & concerts there but of course nothing the night I was in town.

My aim for the night was Vaison-le-Romain & stayed just outside so I could get to see a few things the next day. Which were, of course, the foundations of an old roman town which you could walk around. There were mosaics in situ as well as in the museum, which had inspired me to make the effort to go!

Drove to Lyon after lunch but didn't arrive until about 4pm. Found out the trains were full to Bologna today (Saturday) & that I could maybe only get as far as Milan on Sunday! This was not meant to happen! My plan had been to book, find a place to stay near the hotel, dump my stuff, clean out the car & then return it. This way I would not have to carry my luggage back with me. I'd arranged to drop the car between 5&6pm so needed to go, since it is 25km outside of Lyon itself. Thought I'd do that, catch the shuttle bus back to Lyon & work out my plans after that (find a place to stay, see if there were buses or planes etc). Found it hard to navigate my way out of Lyon as I only had the guidebook city map which had freeways that looked like spaghetti & an 8-lane one that went off the page, with only an arrow saying it went to the airport. Roads from the city centre out to the airport don't actually seem to sign you there until you are on the right one. Helpful! Anyway, I made it.

As it happened, Jeremy was working at the car place yesterday afternoon, was not busy & heard about my dilemmas! He became my travel agent, airport guide, translator, moral support & generally put up with me saying "I don't know" a lot (bus or train? Lyon or Chambéry?). He made it all a lot easier, was very patient & kept his humour. As it ended up, I caught a bus to Chambéry, but had a few hours to kill since it didn't leave until 9pm, arriving at 10. Rang ahead & booked a hotel so I knew where I was going.

Was sitting at a restaurant in the airport when in walked Jeremy after finishing work, to keep me company! Which inevitably meant he later became my porter as well. So you can all thank Jay for keeping me sane last night & helping me out.

Today I have discovered there are no buses to Milan, but I managed to reserve a seat tomorrow on the train as I said before. Didn't sleep well last night since although the hotel is in a great position across the road from the station, it's quite noisy. But I've booked another night because it meant I could have the room today & it's so cnvenient to the station. Am having a weekend day today - not sightseeing at all!!!

Anyway, it's all worked out in the end, as I hoped it would. Next blog will be from Italy!!!

luv,

Belle xxx

Chambéry (surprisingly)

Just a quick message to let you know I'm OK. Mainly due to a guardian angel who took pity on a stressed Australian, but I will provide the details tomorrow as I need to go to bed now. Have had a fantastic few days with just a small hiccup in booking my train trip to Ravenna this afternoon, but I have made it to the first place I would have had to change trains & will figure out the rest tomorrow!

And Jeremy, if you happen to read this I've already emailed you because I left a credit card in the car so please look for it!!!

Until tomorrow,

luv2all

Belle

Arles

It doesn't seem like only two nights since I blogged!

After being on the internet that afternoon I walked outside & realised that it was adjacent to an old roman temple now in the middle of a square! You have to walk up about a dozen big stairs to go inside, & it's got some history of the temple & a few mosaics... not in situ but still, the first mosaics I'd seen. Wandered the streets to see what there was to see & ate across the road from the arena. I have certainly had some meals with great views on this holiday. Spent the evening going through the guide book & local info to pick out what I want to see in this area.

Next morning I found the Jardins de la Fontaines ie Fountain Gardens which, had ruins of a roman temple, a roman tower on top of the hill which was the highest one in the old walls, & (much to my surprise) some roman baths! Initially I was wondering what the canal was - it looked quite nice with swans & ducks! But because the water in below ground level in a big square, it was deceiving. That's my story anyway.

Decided to drive out to the Pont du Gard, the largest or highest or biggest aquaduct spanning a river, & ended up spending a few hours there. There's walking tracks to viewpoints on top of hills on each side of the bridge (climbed both) & then you can walk under it (had to touch it) & picniced again with a fabulous view of it! They've built a foot bridge in the same style adjacent to the lower span so you can cross the river without actually walking on it. It's 3 tiers of arches, all with incredible statistics that I can't remember - oh except the top level has 47 or 48 arches).

Drove towards Avignon with the intention of finding a B&B along the way as we had seen so many previously. Wouldn't you know it? Saw only one that was a 4-star so kept going, only to find myself in Arles. Didn't really matter as there are many thinggs to see here, & both places are pretty central to the whole area I wanted to see. Walked around the town last night to orient myself & saw from the outside the Arena & amphitheatre.

Today I've gone inside both, also seen Les Thermes (roman baths) & the Archeological Museum which had many very impressive mosaics... which I will no doubt learn how to make myself. Have met an Australian girl from Sydney - we kept running into each other at sites & went to the Museum together, & now here at Cyber Espace!

Tomorrow I am leaving the Roman world for a while & heading to a swamp land national park with flamingoes & lots of wildlife apparently. It's only 30km south on the coast: St-something or-other! Will also go to a Lavendar Farm, but don't know if that will be tomorrow or not. There's a beach near the Park that could be tempting for the arvo. Decided to stay in Arles again tonight, but have shifted hotels.

Hope all is well in Australia!

Belle xxx

Nimes

Hello again! Today I feel a lot better than yesterday! Got up this morning & took the walking tour around the ramparts in Carcassonne. It's a fully double-walled city, first inhabited in 600BC but of course the buildings came later, around the 13th Century. Inside is quite touristy, but I enjoyed my little nest last night! Just drove straight to Nimes on the tollway this afternoon, and am staying in the main town in a hotel tonight. It's walking distance from the main sites, & I'll decide tomorrow if I want to stay here another night. I was thinking of going somewhere closer to the coastline & just driving to wherever. But tonight it's convenient to be in the city. I have just been to Les Arènes, a mini-colisseum that is the best-preserved in France. It has both the upper & lower floors intact, & thank goodness the vomitoires haven't disappeared!!! Actually, they're only the alleys to let people leave simultaneously. The outside is quite spectacular, lots of arches etc, but I must say that the inside is a little disappointing, only because it has lost some atmosphere. There are aluminium seats built all over the original ones because they have concerts here in summer! & they can cover the bottom stage in winter. Despite all that, I would have loved to go to a concert but none are on this week.

Must say that the 9 of you who will receive postcards from me written in the cottage should be very grateful! had an adventure sending them, & they almost were lost all together! In Paris we discovered that you can buy packs of 10 prepaid international envelopes that are a bit cheaper than stamps. So I eventually sit down to write all the postcards I'd bought in Paris, Majorca & Spain & use the whole card, expecting to put them in envelopes. However the next day the PO didn't have any, so I dutifully got stamps & squashed them onto tiny spaces free of writing, often half on the front & half on the back of the cards. Left the PO pleased that we'd just made it in time as they closed up behind us. Halfway down the road I realised that none of the cards had addresses on them! Turned back & had to knock a few times & explain the predicament. Fortunately they thought it was funny - handed them back & I steamed off all the stamps to reuse them on the addressed envelopes!

I have a bit more time today so feel like I'm able to catch up on bits of info that usually aren't a priority.
1. My all-terrain, submersible, super-dooper sandals have been great (George!). They have been comfortable since day one & were handy beaching & launching the canoe!
2. My clothes have also been fine. Have not wished I'd put in or left anything behind. The shorts that I accidentally left on my bed I have managed to do without, but would have been great in Singapore.
3. The pocketknife, cutlery, tupperware container, corkscrew & ziplock bags have all had a workout, & I think Danielle was amazed each time I said, oh yes, I've brought that. I have now purchased a small soft esky for my picnic things which has made it easier. Can ditch it later!
4. Mum & dad, the handcream & laundry liquid has been great!

Mysteries of France & Spain:
a. exactly how the numbering system works for the highways, & why there are parallel roads going to the same place - & why you can still be overtaken when going 130km/hr!
b. why sliced bread is sold without the crusts
c. what the french & spaniards have on their cereal/muesli. No matter where we were, cereal was out for breakfast but we'd have to ask for milk to go with it! Maybe they just have the yoghurt...
d. why internet cafés are heated to about 30°C - I'm sweating in here.
e. why 2-euro bottles of wine are often much nicer than 10-euro bottles.
f. why there have only been 2 nice white wines in Paris & Spain.
g. why french & spanish radio consists of mostly 80's music! We have loved it, but it's weird to hear a french song & then Culture Club, Rick Astley, Blondie or anything else from that era.

Anyway, that's about it!
Love, Belle xxx

Back in Carcassonne

Thought you would all like to know I am safe on my first nght alone!!! Will get to that in a minute.
Our last few days flew by - canoeing was an amazing way to see the area and although it took us about twice the estimated time, we realy enjoyed it! had t meet at 10, but they only got s onto the water at about 11.30am. Basically they drop you upstream & you fend for youselves! It was so peaceful & pretty we let the current take us, only dipping our paddles in to direct the canoe. Stoped for lunch & were amazed it was 2pm! We had made it a third of the way!!! Had our picnic on our blanket with our tea in china cups, on the riverbank/ beach & decided we should really do a bit of paddling, or at least find the fast current! Finally made it back at 5pm. You go past many castles & villages built into the cliffs that we'd seen before - but this was a different angle.
Next 2 days have been slow starts & we have taken advantage of the phone & made calls in the morning. Thursday went on a 10km local walk, well sign posted & it took us off the roqds & through woods. Great to see a different part of the countryside. Yesterday we went to some gardnes & chateau on a mountain ridge that overlooks all of the same castles etc. 6km of walks & it is well known for the box hedges sculpted into curving, undulous shapes (impressed by that word?)
Today we packed & cleaned, drove to Bordeaux & then it was all very sad. I, of course, just cried saying goodbye, & was quite fragile driving out, but am feeling better now that I have a) made it out of Bordeaux (this was in question for about half an hour), b) navigated the toll roads which made it quicker as the speed limit is 130km (or 110 in rain!) & c) found a great room within the walls of Carcassonne. I could have a party there as it sleeps 4, has a terrace, and provides breakfast stuff including real coffee YAY! Has a kitchenette too so I will use the leftovers I brought with me tonight & go to bed early so I can take advantage of the terrace in the morning! Will head to Nimes tomorrow. Also have a bottle of red to go with dinner so will be medicinal I'm sure.
Will be in touch asap!
Belle xxx

spain, france & the cottage!!!

We have been out of range of internet access for over a week, so apologies! I have only 15 minutes so have had little time to read emails or comments. next time! We loved Spain & eventually managed to leave, driving up to Carcassonne to see the fairytale like castle & wander iniside its walls. We kept going that night, staying in a hotel beside the road in a tiny place called Roquefixade just east of Foix. Jagged a gorgeous view on our terrasse of the cliff behind, with it,s ruined church & castle on the top. breakfasted out there then drove alf way up & climbed the rest. Spectacular view of mountains, some snowcappe, and the rest of the valley. Afterwards we went through Foix & really enjoyed a tour of an underground river in a tinny! There's limestone stuff (stalagmites etc) & the guide pushes the boat through using the ropes attached to the walls. A lot of the time you have to duck your head as it's so low! again we stayed in a hotel/restaurant n the side of th road (often it's the only option) in Montrejeau, then drove the rest of the way across the Pyrenees to Biarritz the next day. Have started aving picnics by rivers & love the freedom of a car. Stayed just south of Biarritz in St-Jean-de-Luz, both of which are big surfing beaches! and prate towns... came to Our Cottage on Saturday after on one wrong turn which meant we visited Spain again briefly! It's fantastic, with everything we need & despite being such a small hamlet that it doesn,t even have one shop, it's close to lots of fabulous places. We have walked through old castles, seen prehistoric cave paintings via a little rain underground & tomorrow are canoeing down the Dordogne river for 22 km! yes, downstream. are enjoying the xuries of clean clothes, & a kitchen. must go, time running out! love, Belle xxx