A Walk and an Early Weekend in the Tourraine

It's Sunday and we're home from our weekend. That's one of the advantages of no longer working; we get to choose when to go off on a weekend. First, though, Emma came back from her woofing on Sunday evening. Her project has matured and it's time to set it up. I won't say more about it until it's done, though. We will just enjoy having her home for a while.

J and E joined me for an Ile de France walk in the Forêt de Carnelle, north of Paris on Wednesday. This walk was less difficult that the one two weeks ago. It was mostly through forest. M-L sent us this description:

Thanks again, Daniel, for leading us on such a lovely hike and for keeping the rain at bay. I did a little research about the Foret de Carnelle which I would like add to what Daniel and Virginie told us on Wednesday. This is translated (roughly) from the FFR Topo Guide of the Val d’Oise, pp. 90, 94, and 95.

Picture from Wikipedia 

 The Pierre turquaise is the only megalith of the department composed entirely of sandstone. As Daniel said, the name could refer to its color or the Turks. The book says that it is very likely that the name comes from “Turc” because this type of megalith often was named after France’s enemy in medieval times.  As Virginie read to us, the Pierre turquaise was used as a kennel for the Prince of Conti hunting dogs. It was classified “Monument Historique” in 1869 in order to save it from being used to make paving stones for the streets of Paris. (!!) It was destroyed by explosives in 1985 and subsequently partially rebuilt. The book also says that the bas-relief of a woman is on the left “pillar”. I can’t understand why none of us saw her.

The forest probably gets its name from the Celtic word “carn” which means “stone”. Gypsum and marl (marne) quarries were dug in the 19th century. The lake where we ate lunch gets its name from the blue color of the marl underneath.  It and the one next to it are artificial, fed by springs and are former marl quarries, which explains their blue color. The book goes on to say that in present times the presence of microscopic algae give the water a more green hue.

The stone is not at all turquoise. It's a big slab of sandstone laid flat on smaller sandstone pillars, much like a table and very similar to other celtique megalithic structures you find here and there, and lots in Brittany. That the ponds are former quarries makes sense. Just looking at them, we figured that's what they were. They were definitely a greenish gray, almost smoky jade, color under the overcast we had. It rained a bit, mostly drizzle, nothing to keep us from walking. We went up and down hills, along a few fields, on the move for at least 16 km. (10 miles). We passed by an alpaca herd. The animals were very small and the shearing was still showing on their fur. They look very cute.J and E came home with me for dinner, where R joined us before she headed for NYC. Paul and Emma had set the table and everything was really ready, definitely no work for me.

We met Callie and her masters, Ken and Walt.

The next morning, Paul and I set off for St. Aignan. Well, not exactly St. Aignan, just outside, in Mareuil-sur-Cher, where my blogging friend, Ken lives. Ken wrote about our visit, so I don't have much to add. Just click on the link and read on. It was a really pleasant afternoon. I was happy to finally meet this family that I feel I've known for years, from reading their blogs. (Again, Ken's blog is http://ckenb.blogspot.com/ and Walt's is http://www.wcs4.blogspot.com/). I only took one picture, though, of Callie on our walk down the road that runs from the back of their lot through the vinyards to the slightly larger paved road. 

Ken wrote a bit about the Pierwige. Paul lived there as a student from Sept. 1965 until the end of the school year in 1970. I arrived in February, 1970, the same year as Ken. When he came for his Easter break, I was off with the Pitzer group and Claude on our tour of Normandy and Brittany. When Ken came back in May, though, I was probably there. We must have crossed paths, then, and just never knew it. Dick, the one who put us in touch with one another, was there in '68. He and Paul became close friends, but once I entered the picture, I was the one who corresponded most with Dick. In the early days of internet for the common people, the days of Compuserve, both Dick and I were subscribers and found each other. Then, with Facebook, he found me, again. Internet has allowed Paul to find Tania again, too. She was at the Pierwige the year before me and lives in Avignon. We visited her last year. I thought I had written about it, but I guess I didn't; I can't find it. Peter and Jeanne were Pierwigians, contemporaries of Dick's. They will be coming to Paris it see us in October. 

On Friday, we visited Montrésor in the morning -- just a bit of walking through this well-kept, midievel town with its castle at the top and the village below. The church is strange. It's got a magnificent facade, leading you to think it's enormous, but the building is very short! It's a very small church.

We drove through Loches and decided not to stop to see the château. I think Loches rhymes with moche (ugly) and it certainly did not look like a place to visit. I know I visited it 40 some years ago on that Easter trip with Claude, but I think once was enough. On our drive, both on Thursday and Friday, we took the smaller roads and saw some very beautiful countryside. We stopped for a moment in Tours before heading over to Gwen's parents' for an enjoyable lunch and family visit. We got up to leave and the car wouldn't start! Not just not start. There was no electricity, at all. We're not sure what happened; maybe when we stopped, Paul didn't press the Power button hard enough. Whatever it was, the insurance company sent around a repair guy who knew exactly where all the connections were and exactly what to do. We assume he's done this often and knows the Prius well. We are not alone. It was still quite a scare.

From the bouquet of Dalhias
at the Thomas's lunch
 on Friday

We returned to Montrichard for our second night, there. (I must remember that I definitely do not like charming provincial hotels. They are not comfortable.) Montrichard -- you pronounce the "t" because, apparently, it does not come from Mont + Richard, but from mon + trichard (tricheur = cheater). In the town, between the Place du Commerce and the Place du Marché, they have the Rue de la Juiverie, which was not an official ghetto, but is where the Jews who were expelled from Blois in the 12th century settled, before they were eventually exiled from France altogether.

Yesterday was Saturday and the last weekend in July, so the traffic reports of the "juilletistes" crossing paths with the "aoûtiens" were horrendous. We took the small roads through the countryside almost all the way to Paris and had no traffic problems at all.

Friday was Louis' birthday, and the reason we took this early weekend trip was to leave him the house so he could host a barbecue party. Anne is back from her escapade to Lisbon and we'll all get together with the Lebelles from Verrières on Tuesday. 

Rocky -- and another hike

Picture of Rocky, Aurelia and me at Christmas 2010

Let me start with Rocky. Paul took him to the vet yesterday. We knew this was going to be the last time. These last few months have been hard on us, but again last weekend, he stopped eating and was just barely drinking. He was so weak on Tuesday that Paul made the appointment. Rocky was 18, a very good age for a cat. We will have wonderful memories of him and Pussycat.

Yesterday was Wednesday, Ile de France Walks day, so I went. It was announced as an 18 km. walk with moderate hills and I thought I'd be up to it. I'm not up to that kind of walk. Well, I don't know. It was announced that we'd take the 5:19 train back and if possible the 4:19. In the end, if it hadn't been for my dropping so far behind, we could've caught the 3:19, so the pace was not what I was up to. Maybe, if we had maintained a slower pace, I wouldn't have collapsed the way I did. We saw some beautiful countryside: cows out in pastures; wheat; corn; vinyards; forest. We also had a bit of rain (not much) and a muddy last hour. It's a region of clay. We went through a hamlet "Les Plâtrières", so there was plaster; and Citry, known for its monolithic millstones. We walked along an aqueduct, l'Aqueduc de la Dhuys, for a while. The kids will remember spending a summer Sunday a year around here at the Quagliarolis. In fact, I'm pretty sure we walked past their place. I sort of recognized the house and the setup of the vegetable garden in front. I didn't have the time to really check. I was already falling behind.

Today -- Bastille Day. I picked up J & E at the airport and dropped them at their apartment just as the Patrouille de France opened the parade. We couldn't see anything, but we could sure hear the planes. I got home just as the parade started. Now, I'm sort of watching the Tour de France as I type.

An Ile de France Walk -- at last

A small gaggle of geese by the river

Caillebotte property at Yerres

At last! It's been such a long time since I went on one of these walks! Yesterday, when I decided that I really wanted to go, Louis called to ask if one of us could take his car for inspection, but thank goodness he was able to take care of it, because of course, I would have done it, but it would have been one more Wednesday lost. As it was it was a gorgeous day for a walk.

Take a look at the Ile de France Walks blogpost for details of this particular walk. Every week I get the email invitation and almost every week I say to myself, "boy, I'd like to go on that walk" and every week, something seems to come up to prevent it. Sometimes, it's just not for me -- too long, or too difficult.

Even today, I dropped out a little early with some other walkers. I had a blister that was bothering me and didn't think it necessary to continue for the sake of continuing. I dropped out at Yerres, where the group came up to a bridge on the river practically in front of the Caillebotte property. This is the house that belonged to the Caillebotte family and that he painted in several of his paintings. I recognized the areas in front of the doors where the women of the household read, sewed, knitted, while he painted, with the immense garden in the background. Having seen the Caillebotte exhibit in May, I was very interested. (My post on the Caillebotte exhibit.)

Visits from classmates

Been trying to figure out how to write this post for a couple of weeks. I keep putting it off because there's always something coming up that I'll want to add and I figure I want to get it all in one letter. This probably comes from the old reflex of trying to pack everything into a single aerogramme and save on postage plus just plain laziness.
I've spoken about making acquaintance with my high school classmates (Girls High, 212) before. There was a walk with Sylvia (http://ellenlebelle.blogspot.com/2009/08/what-walk.html), a day with Rachel, and several short visits with Candace, who comes through Paris on business. Well this month, it's a long visit from Jackie and her husband. They are not staying with us; they rented an apartment in St. Germain des Près, in the center of left-back Parisian life. It's a perfect location for anyone coming to Paris.
We met up for a coffee a day or so after their arrival, when they weren't too jet-lagged and had a nice, long, catching up chat. We've gotten to know a bit about each other through facebook updates and, more intensively, through an e-mail list group. Those classmates of us that are on this list write about anything and everything without any PC. On facebook, one tends to censor oneself; well, I do, and I know others do, too, because it's so public. In fact, I don't say much at all on facebook; I stay away from political comments, from judgmental things. The e-mail list does not. We are free to say what we think and have those who might not agree discuss it. I must admit that, for the most part, we seem to agree on most things political. There is wonderful perspective on things racial. There's great warmth and understanding and commiseration on things familial, like in-laws, aging parents, separation, children, grandchildren, illness....

Back to this visit. On Monday, the 6th, the four of us (Jackie, me and husbands) went to Giverny and Rouen. Here we are standing on "the" bridge at "the" lily pond at Giverny. It was a cloudy day and the lilies were shut tight, so it was not as spectacular as I've seen it on other days. Each time I return to the Monet house, though, I see the Japanese prints he collected in more detail and like them more and more. More on Monet's house and gardens at Giverny
I guess it's because the weather was not so gorgeous that we more or less sped through the gardens and finished up earlier than I thought we would. We did not wait around to have lunch at the hotel up the street. We headed for Rouen.
Rouen is not far from Giverny. Giverny, itself is about an hour and a half from Paris, but can take longer if you spend an hour just getting out of Paris! Rouen is a city-museum all by itself. It is, or perhaps was, a major port, where goods were transferred to and from barges for travel further up the Seine. There are still lots of buildings from the 15th and 16th century, with their visible wood structure -- corresponds to Tudor style. There is still a street named Rue des Juifs, harking back to the Jewish ghetto. Rouen is where Joan of Arc was tried and burned at the stake. There's lots of history, here. There's also lots of war damage. The allies bombed the center of Rouenpreparation for D-Day. So next to an old tudor-style building, you'll find a 1950ish cement block of public housing. The Palais de Justice, still has bullet holes and artillery damage wherever it did not affect the structure. All the structural damage has been repaired, of course. We walked around the center a bit, had lunch and then headed on to the Musée des Beaux Arts.
The museum was the reason we were in Rouen. This year has been the year of Impressionism in Rouen and this particular exhibit is of Rouen as the subject of Impressionist art. Bridges, countryside, and, of course, Monet's Cathedral impressions. We remarked that of those paintings of the cathdral, there are only two points of view and all the paintings from each point of view seem to be done from sketches that were identical. I asked Francine about this and she said that of course they used copy methods and he would have had his canvasses all prepared with the main sketch and ready for paint. Jackie's husband has an especially good eye for detail and it was fun. It seemed we all share a distinct irreverence for art exhibits and feel free to comment.
Instead of taking the autoroute back to Paris, we took country roads and saw cows and horses -- but mostly cows.
A week ago, I met up with Jackie and Ed at the flea market, the Marché aux Puces. Originally, the idea was to meet up with Candace, who was supposed to have been at the dubbing studio nearby, but she ended up having to go straight elsewhere and skipping the Paris stop. So, the three of us window-shopped. The objective was to find a wedding gift. And we did! And we had lots of fun looking for it! They are very knowledgeable about Art Nouveau and Art Deco and we were immediately attracted to some very nice silver, which unfortunately was not quite right for the wedding gift, but was just beautiful to contemplate. That reminds me to send them the link to Roger's site; he makes beautiful Art Deco-inspired furniture and sculptures.
Let me now go back to before they arrived! Claire et al came through on their way back to England after a week at Pierre and Gillette's. Too short a visit! Barely enough time to celebrate both Gwen's and Aurelia's birthdays!
More photos: Ellen's album for August

The frosting is so much better than that candle!

Ready, Set, uh oh

I didn't go to Washington. This is very disappointing. I was all excited about it and there was a big delegation going. Unfortunately, a volcano in Iceland disrupted plans for me, several other delegates, and thousands of other passengers.
Last week started on a sad note, with Christine's funeral. I wrote afterwards to Ken, Sandy and their network of shared friends with the Touzés:

"We went to Christine's funeral today. We've been to quite a few neighbors' funerals there and have never seen it packed as full as it was today. St. Saturnin is one of the biggest churches in our department. It was quite something. But knowing Christine and how she was, it was not really surprising. We saw friends, former neighbors, current neighbors, her colleagues, probably some patients all grown up and some parents of her patients. Steve came, for Julien, and Rosette because of fond memories of Christine. And family. Christine's sisters spoke, Emmanuel prepared something but had someone else read it because he just couldn't. It was, indeed, very moving. Christine died just on the eve of his birthday. Julien and Jacques also spoke, and if they did not break down, I think we nearly did. She will be missed. You already know and feel it.

"We came home and I immediately made a batch of my cracker brownies and as soon as they were cool enough to cut, we went over to the Touzes' with them. The house was bursting at the seams with people, but since it's a beautiful spring day, the garden took the overflow and is as beautiful as always. 

"By the way, Julien and Gaetan are expecting a baby girl towards the end of May and they are moving back to France. They've found a place in Montreuil."

Tuesday was Anne's birthday, but since it was Tuesday, we didn't get together. She had dinner plans with friends. I went from the library, at 6:00, to the AARO board meeting across the river, which I left a little after 7:00 to return to the library for the movie night. In the series of cinema adaptations, she presented Schindler's List. A little background story of how the book got written, how the movie got made, comparisons between the book and movie with some reading and a few scenes from the movie. What can I say. With just a few scenes, the whole movie came back to me and I wasn't the only person in the audience with tears. 

Wednesday was a day to take care of me: hair, nails,etc. And packing! Thursday and Friday were taken up entirely with the STC France and STC Trans-Alpine chapters' Content Strategy Forum. This was the first time that I wasn't so involved with organizing the event. It was a great conference. The workshops and conference sessions were fully booked. In fact, they had to add 20 additional seats and could have probably filled more. (http://www.regonline.co.uk/builder/site/Default.aspx?eventid=766137) I didn't get to really attend anything as I was volunteering at the registration desk. I did get to two conference sessions as room monitor. I did get to see many friends, including David Farbey, who wrote a great review of the conference and Mike Hamilton, who manned the MadCap table. Mike came with his wife and I hope they had a good stay in Paris before heading to Amsterdam. I hope they are able to fly back home to California without any problem.

Rahel Bailie, one of the keynote speakers, was stuck in Paris. We spent some time online on Saturday to find a hotel room and then we met on Monday for some fun. We met at Denfert-Rochereau and walked north, through the Jardins de Luxembourg and St. Germain des Près to the Louvre, where we took the metro to the Grand Palais. There we went to see two exhibits: The way of Taoism and Turner and his painters. Well, I thought the jade carvings were extraordinary, but the silk paintings looked all very much alike and, of course, I couldn't read any of the texts. Since I know very little about Taoism, I was intrigued but not enough to spend a lot of time. Then, we went to the Turner exhibit. I'm not a great Turner fan, but I do see how he could be a considered a precursor to the Impressionists. In this exhibit, his paintings are side by side with painters who influenced him, such as Le Lorrain, and later, by those he influenced. I preferred the painters who influenced him in landscapes. It's not until you get to the really late paintings that you get those fantastic skies of his.

Today, I was planning to go on the Ile de France walks hike, but I ended up on the wrong train. Stupid me. So I came back to Paris and hiked home from the Bibliothèque François Mitterand, through the Bois de Vincennes.

Walking, walking, and more walking

This was a week of walking!
After walking to and from the painting class at Francine's. That wasn't too strenuous. On Tuesday I really forget what I did except for an appointment in Nogent near the big market in the middle of the afternoon. It really started on Wednesday.

Mary Lynne took us Ile de France Walkers on a wonderful hike along the Bièvre from St. Quentin en Yvelines to Jouy en Josas. It's always such a pleasure to meet up with old friends now and to meet newer arrivals. For once, I didn't feel like I was lagging behind, either, so that was nice. It seemed to me we were all walking at about the same pace. There were almost 30 of us for this walk, which is perhaps a bit too many, but we managed.

Alexander (now almost 9 months old) came along with his mother again. He's now moved to a fantastic back pack I took pictures of to remember what brand it is in case we want to get one as a gift. When I think of the elementary front pack, and then the backpack, we had, I think the design improvements are extraordinary. The only drawback is, for the front packs, more complicated attachments, and for the back pack, added weight.

The Bièvre is a short tributary of the Seine. It runs into the Seine in Paris, not far from Notre Dame. The water, back in Louis XIV's day, was so pure it was used for rinsing fabric and thread dyes. The famous "toile de Jouy" was produced in Jouy en Josas and rinsed in the river's water and the Gobelins tapestrys were set up (still there) in Paris, on Ave. des Gobelins, Paris 13. They rinsed the dyed wool in the river. Apparently, there were also tanneries along the river and that would certainly have polluted the river for the dyers and in conjunction with dyers, the river became too polluted and was covered for most of its distance until recently. Interesting for those who are familiar with Paris, the printer who set up his fabric printing business in Jouy was Oberkampf, so that's where that metro stop got its name. He chose Jouy not only because the water was excellent for the process, but he also had enough land to dry the cloth, and he wasn't far from the court at Versailles to boot.

The walk is not always along the river, but close enough. There are several ponds and we had our lunch in a clearing at a pond. At Buc we also crossed under the aqueduct that was built in the 1680s to carry water from the Saclay plateau to the artificial canals at Versailles. It was still functioning in the 1950s and is still in good condition even if it is no longer used.

About half of the group decided to visit the museum at Jouy en Josas. It's interesting, although I'm not sure I'd go there on purpose just to see the museum. The museum is in the old Oberkampf home; all the other fabric works buildings are gone. I think what struck me is the variety of Jouy designs and colors. I'm so used to seeing the same design in red or black, I thought that was all they did. There are good illustrated explanations of how the fabric was printed, the chemical process and all that. The arrows led us upstairs, but when I tried to open what I thought was the door to the rest of the exhibit, it wouldn't open, so I just assumed it was closed and went back downstairs. I was not alone in doing this and, from what I heard afterwards, we missed about four rooms of samples and upholstered furniture.

We finished with a short walk to the train station, but no trains were operating, so we had to get on a bus. I ended up getting on a bus that went to the Velizy-Chavilles station, but the others took a bus to Versailles Chantier or Massy Paliseau. I should have gone with them. My bus took us meandering around Jouy for a while before heading on to Vélizy-Chavilles. It was a pretty ride, though.
On Thursday, I walked to and from Francine's again and then headed straight back to the RER station to go to Paris to meet up with a group of AAWE friends for a walking tour of the 1st arrondissement -- a chocolate tour. Iris is a young guide, a real professional guide, whom I highly recommend. She started us off at the Louvre, where Marie-Thérèse, Louis XIV's queen established chocolate as the drink of choice. We then went to where the first chocolat maker set up with a royal patent. We stopped at the boulangerie patisserie that supplies the Elysée Palace. There, we had a sample of an "Opéra", a coffee and chocolate pastry that is sold in almost every patisserie in France. This one was especially good as the balance between the chocolate and coffee was perfect. Of course, we only tasted the very finest quality of chocolate on this tour, all made with 100% cocoa butter and no other kind of oil. (Leslie Charbonnel has kindly allowed me to share her pictures with you -- I forgot to take my camera!)
We then made our way through the Palais Royal gardens (where Anne d'Autriche once lived with the royal princes, Louis XIV and his brother) and went on to three different chocolate makers where we tasted different samples. It was a very tasty tour, but it was just samples and not an excessive amount of ingested chocolate. I found where I'm going to get some year-end gifts, though! Unfortunately, this was a slow walk, though, kind of like a museum and my legs and back hate that.

Friday, Paul and I went to the Renoir exhibit at the Grand Palais. Being a Renoir exhibit, it was crowded. Too crowded. If you tried to look closely at a painting or even the sign with the title, you were pushed out of the way; if you stood back to admire, you couldn't see because of the people passing by in front of you. Luckily, I have a carte Sésame and can go back whenever I want. I might try some morning. I was very happy to stop walking when we got home. That walk uphill from the RER seemed interminable.

An then on Saturday was the Money Matters for Women conference in the 7th. I was a volunteer so I had to get there by 11. Paul drove me in. At least I didn't have to walk around too much. There was a lot of going up and down stairs, but that was a pleasant change. I think I attended some good sessions and the day ended with Samina, who led us through a speedy prosperity workshop. Having done a real workshop with her, I can say that one should take the time to think through the answers to the questions, because if you speed through it, you end up with a superficial view. I think everyone understood that the session was just the beginning.