Three Road trips, three very different reasons. That wasn’t the only story, but it was a big part of our week.
I’ll work my way up to it. But first, let me tell you about our afternoon in the…
2,500km and counting!
Tag Archives: Travel
Return to France
So it’s perhaps unusual, if not at least unexpected for me to include the Hebrew letter Lahmed as today’s feature image. There’s a reason & I’ll get to it, but for now be it known that we made it safely back to our home-not-home in western France.
Hello Montreal!
Today’s feature photo shows a hardanger doily that I stitched, years ago, for friends. I didn’t take a picture of it at the time, but we were recently there for a visit so….
A lot of work went into that piece; many hours of patiently stitching thread upon thread, and it makes me think of the extent to which life is built in a similar fashion… Continue reading
One More Week…
The clock is ticking seemingly quicker than before and our time in Canada is drawing to a close. This time next week we’ll be in Montreal for services with the church in St-Laurent before taking to the skies on Sunday night. It’s hard to believe that things are winding down…
But I’m getting ahead of myself. Let me tell you a bit about where we are & what’s going on now.
Today is France’s National Holiday
… so it’s a particularly good reason to Pray for France!
So often we see the “Pray for ____ “ images in times of tragedy but that is not the case today. Today is a good day to pray for our adopted nation because in the same way that the French are celebrating their liberation from heavy-handed authorities (the monarchy & the church of the 18th century), so we have been working there for 3.5 years to see them liberated in a spiritual sense.
Today in particular… please pray for France and our work there.
Now… let me begin with an oversight…
We have a Graduate!
12 years and many hours of study later… we have a graduate. Wearing her blue cap & gown, Soph felt she “looked like a pillow”… but what a pretty, intelligent, Christian “pillow” she is. 🙂
A lot has happened over the past week, so I may split things up a bit and run it into next week’s post, but for now at least… the spotlight is on Soph!
Chateau de Brissac… the upper floors
In my last post, I introduced to to the Chateau de Brissac and showed you the principal rooms on the main floor. Today I want to take you further.
As promised, I’ll take you through a dramatic episode in the history of the French monarchy, we’ll talk about the arts and I’ll reveal how it is that hunting at Brissac is not reserved for men only! I’ll also tell you about how you can spend a night there and live like a Duke or Duchess yourself!
Let’s go!
Chateau de Brissac… a stately country home
The road between Châtellerault and Angers takes you through portions of three French departments (la Vienne, l’Indre et Loire, la Maine et Loire) passing by wide swaths of agricultural land and, as you approach Angers, field after field of vineyards. For the past seven months I’ve been making the 130km weekly, with the exception of school holidays, in order to teach English at a business school there.
Each trip makes me a bit more familiar with the general surrounding and from time to time my schedule allows me to explore points of interest along the way. Regular readers will recall that I first stopped in Brissac back in January, but was unable to visit the castle as it was closed for the season. Last week was different… last week I had a guided tour.
Chateau de Chambord… a closer look
My first visit was in 1995 and I’ve probably been there a dozen times since then… but never inside. I’m not sure why exactly. Perhaps is was a lack of enough time to do it justice, perhaps the combined entry price of a family of five scared me off (although they’re not as much castle-goers as I am… “You seen one, you seen ’em all”, while not entirely an accurate summation of their feeling, is not totally inaccurate either), or perhaps it was those who told me that it was rather empty, or unfurnished, compared to other castles. Whatever the reason, I’d never been in… until recently.
The Return… in more ways than one
A can of Canada Dry, served in a white paper cup, proudly emblazoned with a red maple leaf… Hello Air Canada, thanks for bringing us “home”. It sounds weird to say that because “HOME-home” is Canada, but “small-h home” is France. At least for now.
AIM Long 