The second half

As the holiday progressed we settled into a vague routine of alternating a day of activity (albeit sometimes limited) with a day of lounging at the cottage. This suited us quite well, and made for a relaxed time with a nice balance of doing things with lazing.

On one of our 'active' days we drove north, first of all stopping at Villedieu-les-Poeles. Villediue is famous for its manufacture of copper pans, and my mother had decided that she wanted to buy one ... until she saw the price of them. There were some lovely pans (if you appreciate the aesthetic appeal of a shiny, vaguely orange pan), but for anything bigger than something suited to a dolls' house you're looking at paying at least a couple of hundred Euros. We came away from the various shops without a shiny new pan, but with a new appreciation of the price of copper.

Although we'd stopped at Villedieu, we were actually on our way to Cerisy-la-Salle to visit V and her husband J. V is the wonderful woman who read my blog before I went to France, contacted me through my OU email (she's a fellow OU student who recently studied the same creative writing course as me) and offered to translate all my medical letters, medications list and allergies. To add to her wonderfulness, when we arrived we found that she'd used my allergy info to make some Becky-friendly scones and home-made Jam, followed by very lovely fruit salad. She'd even managed to find some decaf tea for me (I can't have caffeine as it interacts with some of my meds and makes me feel ill - like the worst bits of being drunk and hungover all at once). As we sat and had afternoon tea on the patio we chatted and enjoyed the wonderful view over the valley, but as we sat there we could see dark clouds building and rumbles of thunder in the distance. The distance decreased and soon enough the thunder was overhead and the view had disappeared. In fact we could barely see the end of the garden. The storm was spectacular (if a little disconcerting in its proximity), with rain that wasn't rain but hail - pebbles of hail that bounced back off the ground and looked like suddenly sprouting clover on the lawn. Here's a pic ...

After being forced inside by the weather we were shown around V and J's lovely home and shown some of their amazing craft work. J does beautiful embroidery that he designs himself using pictures from books and photos, and he displays the finished pieces of art on the walls downstairs. V has the walls upstairs, on which she displays the most amazing pieces of patchwork/quilting that I've ever seen. They are truly breathtaking and I wish I had some pictures of them to show you, but unfortunately I don't. Not only does V do wall hangings, but also bed-spreads, cushions and was working on an amazing kimono. She is an incredibly talented woman, although far too modest about it when I said so to her. It was a great pleasure to meet V and J, and we'll hopefully be meeting again at the end of the month when V comes over here to visit her daughter who lives in Northumberland (and rather amazingly used to live just six streets away from me!).

A couple of days later we went to a medieval festival in Fougeres, which was being held in the old part of the town. Part of the garden/park was set up as a medieval village with various tents pitched as homes, campfires (which I had to be very careful about steering clear of because of the smoke), a few random medievally-type things I couldn't identify, and some stalls demonstrating medieval crafts/skills such as chainmail making. I think that some people were actually staying in the camp over the weekend (it was a weekend-long festival), and everyone who was taking part in the festival - as opposed to visitors to the festival - were in costume. Here are a few pics of the medieval village ...

Further up, near the chateau we came across a choir singing in the square. When we arrived they were singing an English madrigal that I knew from my singing days. They didn't seem very confident with it, but I suspect that was the English rather than the piece itself, and they soon showed themselves as a good choir when they did their next piece that they obviously knew much better and were more confident with. The choir were all dressed in medieval costume, and rather amusingly the condutor had a dog with her that was clearly used to standing in front of the choir.

We wandered around the rest of the festival, taking in the atmosphere, watching children enjoy donkey rides around the outside of the chateau, mooching around the various market stalls selling crafts and traditional foods, and enjoying the visual effects of some outdoor theatre even though we couldn't understand the French. I don't have any pics of the theatre, but here's one of a woman spinning wool in one of the market stalls ...

A couple of days after the festival we visited some beautiful gardens - Parc Floral de Haute Bretagne - that V had suggested we visit and which was only about 20 minutes drive from the cottage. The gardens are divided into differently themed areas, and although each is very different, they're all very beautiful. Here's a small selection of photos from the gardens ...

On my last day in France J (step-dad, not J as in V and J) and I visited Fougeres chateau. It's a weird castle because it was built practically in a valley, which if you ask me isn't the best place to put your defending fortress, and therefore not very surprising that the first chateau on the site (made of wood) was burnt down. It was almost immediately rebuilt, this time in stone, and it's the remains of this that are left. In its day it was very much a castle with defence as it's purpose, and was in fact one of the primary fortresses defending the country of Brittany before they lost their long-fought battle with France and it was absorbed into its neighbour. Fougeres is on the Brittany border and therefore was one of the primary battle areas ... why then did they build their castle at the bottom of a hill??? Anyway, J and I went to the chateau to have a look around, and here are a few pics ...

So that was my holiday, and a wonderful time I had too :o) Despite some lung tightness due to thundery weather at various times, I didn't have any major health problems, and I'm deeply thankful for that. I'm very pleased (and thankful to V) that I was able to go prepared with translations of everything in case I needed it, though even more pleased that I didn't need to use them. I'm also very thankful that the journey home was less eventful than my flight out, and it was lovely of W to meet me at Newcastle airport and bring me home :o)

All in all I had a great time with a good mix of doing things and doing nothing. Here's to a relaxing summer :o)