Summer Trip

Bonjour

We have recently returned from a fantastic 3 week long holiday. Two weeks in the South West of France and one week in Oxford.

The first week we stayed in a cute Chateau in the Medoc region, which is known for its great wines. It was about a six and a half hour drive from Paris, with most of that cruising (legally!) at 130 km/hr.

Chateau Pomys - our room was on the top floor, second window from the right

We then moved onto the Vendee region, which is about 3 hours north from the Medoc region. We stayed in a holiday home (called a 'gite' in French) in the countryside. We were now much closer to the beach, within 20 minutes drive we had several beaches to chose from. So as you can imagine, we spent plenty of time there. I even dusted off my surfboard that came all the way from NZ with us!

This was our regular spot for the week at the beach called Les Conches

Yay, I finally caught one!

This was our gite, and the spot of many summer evening meals.

On the way home back to Paris we decided to break up the 6 hour journey by staying the night half way. We were recommended, by our French tutor, an abbey called 'Hotel Abbaye Royale De Fontevraud' which had been turned into a hotel. It was in a beautiful setting, and it dated back to the 12th century!

Catherine's artistic photo of the abbey

My symmetrical and sophisticated photo :)

Then our final week of our 3 week holiday was spent in Oxford. This was my first visit to Oxford, and Catherine's first time back since graduating. We stayed in a guest room in Catherine's old college (ironically called New College). Amongst visiting many of the colleges, Catherine had organised for us to meet up with a number of her friends who still live in Oxford.

The beautiful grounds of New College

Catherine and her good friend Anna

Catherine and her crazy bunch of Chemistry friends!

A Few Ups and One Down

Bonjour :)

It has been a while between posts, with things been rather busy.

We have had Catherine's parents and Nana staying with us over the last 3 weeks or so, which has made for a rather eventful time. Unfortunately Catherine's father (Ray) had a heart attack several days into his stay with us here in Paris. Fortunately though, he has been making a remarkable recovery after spending one week in the hospital, and resting up in our apartment. As I write this they are on their way back to NZ, via Hong Kong.

Before the visit to the hospital, we all had a lovely time visiting Claude Monet's garden in a little village about an hour and a half out of Paris called Giverny.

The centre of the gardens with Monet's house in the background.

Those of you savvy with Monet's paintings may recognise these lilies.

Some tourists walking through the garden (a.k.a. 'the in-laws')



We drove up the road to an old village called Les Andelys.

Some of you smart cookies would realise we would need a car for this (you're very sharp), we purchased a car just before the troops arrived.

The journey continues... we arrived at a slightly more manly landscape (less flowers more ruins!), Chateau Gaillard, which Richard the Lionheart built in 1197!

Poor Ray had to stare at a blank white wall for a whole week while in the hospital, so after several days of resting up in our apartment we took him out for a treat.

Bienvenue au Chateau de Versailles

Versailles is a beautiful town about 40 minutes outside of Paris, which has a spectacular Chateau with amazing grounds.

The young, beautiful and wise (you chose the order)

Mon beau pere (Ray), belle mere (Elaine), et belle grand mere (Nana)

Canary Islands

Catherine and I have recently returned from a fantastic time in Canary Islands, which are the Spanish islands off the coast of North Africa, we were on Gran Canaria to be specific. We stayed with our friends Stephanie and Mario. You may remember Stephanie as she was one of Catherine's bridesmaids.

Stephanie, Mario and Catherine in a seaside fishing village known as Puerto de Mogan

On our way out to dinner

We spent 8 days on the island, which is exactly what the doctor ordered. As you can imagine we spent a big percentage of our time on the beach, with fantastic warm weather.

The lovely white sandy beaches with many tourists sprinkled around

Another tough day at the office!

The impressive sand dunes of Maspalomas

They call the island a small continent as there are so many different climates and terrains. In fact in the north of the Island, where Stephanie & Mario's place is, it would be 18 degrees and cloudy, and then we would drive 40 min south to the beach and it was sunny and 25 degrees!

It was great to have Stephanie as our personal guide. She new all the spots to visit. One of these places was a walk in the mountains called Cruz de Tejeda, which was about 1600 meters above sea level.

Cruz de Tejeda - the girls walking in the distance. Our destination is the highest rock in the picture.

As you can see we had an amazing time on Gran Canaria. It was fantastic to go to the beach, get some sun on our pasty white skin, be surrounded by nature, and smell fresh air again! Basically, it was a reminder of home :)

Anniversary, Brother, Snow & Romania

It's been an exciting month since the last post.

First of all, as some of you may remember, we got married one year ago on the 26th January, which has gone past so quickly! We decided to celebrate by having a fantastic meal at the restaurant on the Eiffel Tower!! It was an amazing experience, with wonderful food, great service, excellent view, and of course lovely company :)

On our way to the restaurant, which is on the 2nd level of the tower

A few days before we celebrated our anniversary, my big brother (Robert) came to stay with us. This was fantastic! One of the highlights was hanging out at the Musee du Louvre (a huge museum).

Little bro & big bro

This was a slightly large painting which was on the opposite side of the room to the Mona Lisa.

Also we've had a bit of snow over the last week or so. I was in London for the big dump which made things rather interesting as my class got cancelled as hardly any transport was working.

In London, when a wee bit of snow fell :)

In Paris, the same day (taken by Catherine) - obviously snow looks prettier in Paris

On Sunday night I gave my first ever sermon at our evening service at Church. It seem to go well, and I got some encouraging feedback.

I'm off to Romania tomorrow!! There is a group of 14 of us young adults (18-30yrs) from my church going to visit and serve in an orphanage there. We've been fund-raising and planning for the last couple of months, so it should be very cool. We'll be there for a week.

Love to you all,
Paul (& Catherine)

Happy New Year!

We had a great Christmas here, even though we were missing all our family and friends. It was a nice relaxed day, went to the Christmas service at church, and then cooked ourselves a good old NZ roast lamb! They sell them here - and they're quite cheap too :)

Me enjoying a wee Christmas drink on our (very small) balcony

We also went for a walk along the Champs Elysees, which is the hugely popular road in central Paris with the Arc de Triomphe at one end, and amazing Christmas lights!

Christmas lights on Avenue des Champs Elysees

Christmas trees outside Le Pantheon & Notre Dame (both huge churches)

In contrast to NZ's tropical heat wave, we've had a rather cool time here in Paris. We had a week or so where the temperature didn't rise above zero degrees!!

Snow outside our apartment! (view from our bedroom)

Catherine all dressed up for a cold day in Paris, down the street from our apartment

We are very blessed to have such a fantastic apartment. We feel like we can call it home now, with all our boxes unpacked and mostly everything in its proper place - it's basically me letting down 'team tidy'! :)

The view from our apartment. If you look closely you can see the top of Notre Dame and the Eiffel Tower!