Giverny

30 July 2011

I’ve always wanted to see Monet’s garden in Giverny. Well, now it is only 45 kilometres from where we live!
The little village, Giverny, is already something to see and then still add Monet’s house and garden and it is a lovely place to visit. The day started rainy, but after lunch the sun came out. We only left after 2, but you could spend a whole day in the village and gardens.

I don’t know how to describe the garden, all I can say is that it is only flowers and flowers and more flowers. And then there is the water and water-lilies. It is really beautiful.

We ended our visit with nutella crêpes and hot chocolate with cream…

I took too many photos to post here, I will put the rest on Facebook…

Bicarbonate de soude

10 July 2011

We were invited for a braai with Anelle and Pieter today. They are from South Africa, and moved here about two months ago after three years in England. Pieter works at the same company as Danie.
They stay in Ville D’Avray, closer to Paris centre. We had a lovely day and came back with enough leftovers for tomorrow and books to read and magazines, and…  That’s Anelle, she loves to help and share… She was ready to pack all we need for our house while we still wait for our container. : )
Yesterday I decided to make malva pudding to take with. Ok, to buy flour is the first challenge. It does not help you to know its farine in french. There are different farine for all different things you can bake : )  I will still have to research and translate the whole farine thing. But what I bought did work…  there was a photo of cake on the packaging… that helped.
The second challenge was bicarb. I could not find it anywhere and had no idea then what it was in french. I had to come back and after the help of the internet knew this: You do get it packed for baking, but not all shops stock it. You could find 5kg buckets in the swimmingpool isle. : ) And at the pharmacy you can buy smaller quantities, used to clean
teeth.
My malva pudding tasted fine, baked with the teeth whitening bicarbonate de soude and we had it with English cream, as custard is called here.
But… Voilà!  … tjops, wors, potato salad and malva pudding with custard in Ville D’Avray!

A walk through Parc des Impressionistes…
 

A Sunday in Paris

3 July 2011

Much better to visit Paris on a Sunday. All the shops are closed, but attractions are still open. For everyone under 26 you can buy day cards for half price. This time we drove to Neuilly Sur Seine and took the metro from there. We took snacks in our bags and we were ready for the day. We have lovely summer weather now. We almost want to complain about the heat… but maybe we shouldn’t as they forecast rain from tomorrow.

We walked through the bird market and only looked at the Notre Dame from the outside. The queues were way too long.