Poisson d'Avril and Paque

Hey, how many of you had a fish on your back on Thursday? The French enjoy April Fool's Day, but instead of saying "April Fool's" they say, "Poisson d'Avril" which means, April Fish.


Easter is Paque in French. Once again, we have found some similar commercial products for sale, but not to the extravagance as the US. The chocolate rabbits have been in store windows for several weeks, as have chocolate fish, and chocolate hens. They don't do Easter chicks here (which means, no peeps). Happy Easter everyone!

Greek Islands

One of the days we were in Greece we took a day cruise of 3 islands, Poros, Hydra and Aegina. It was a warm, sunny day, perfect for being on the water.

The first island we stopped at was Poros, we had a bit of time to stroll the streets and admire the port. Then it was on to Hydra. Hydra has no motorized transportation, and the preferred mode of travel is by foot or mule. We found a port-side cafe and enjoyed a glass of beer/wine and watched the slower pace of life there go by. The last stop was at Aegina. We took an additional bus tour of this island and saw several pistachio plantations, as Aegina is Greece's largest producer of the nuts. We also visited a beautiful Greek Orthodox Church. It is new, as opposed to some the churches we'd seen in Athens.

On the ship, we enjoyed watching the views of the islands as well as lunch and entertainment. They had two traditional Greek dancers entertain. It was fun to see the traditional costumes and hear the music. We added our "oompa's" along with the other passengers.

Greek salad

My favorite food in Greece was Greek salad. I enjoyed Greek salad at least once each day we were there.

I've had Greek salad back home, but it wasn't a "true" Greek salad. Greek salad is made with fresh tomatoes, cucumbers, red onions, green peppers, oregano, feta cheese, kalamata olives, and olive oil. One of the biggest differences was the amount of feta cheese in the salads. The salads were topped with thick slices of cheese - delicious.

Greece

We recently returned from a visit to Athens. I have a new appreciation for the phrase, "It's Greek to me!" We had a great time and saw a lot of historic sites we never imagined seeing in our lifetime.

A visit to Athens must begin at the Acropolis. That's the hilltop that has the Parthenon and other ancient buildings on it. The Propylaea (below) was the building that served as the gateway to the rest of the Acropolis.

The Parthenon has undergone several destructions and rebuilds, the current ruins date back to the 400's BC. It was built as the temple to the Goddess Athena, the protector of the city of Athens.

Another part of the ancient city we toured was the Agora (below). That was the marketplace and city center. I imagined Socrates and Aristotle wandering the streets as we walked the area. The Agora doesn't have as many preserved ruins as the Acropolis, but it does have a the only temple ruins that still has a roof, the Temple of Hephaestus (the god of iron).

This is the Temple of the Olympian Zeus (below). The 13 remaining pillars were part of 104 massive columns. Construction began in the 6th century BC but the temple wasn't completed until the time of the Roman ruler Hadrian (2nd century AD).

Very near the temple, is Hadrian's Arch, which the ruler built to differentiate the ancient city from the Roman city.

L'ile de re part 2

Last fall we visited an island on the Atlantic call L'ile de re. See the post from September 21, 2009. The evening of February 28 a huge storm struck the Atlantic coast and created a lot of damage inland. Some of you emailed us to see if we were 'OK'. The storm called 'Xynthia' went north of Toulouse and missed us.

Xynthia hit during high tide and L'ile de re was devastated. When we visited, it was one large connected island with nice roads, bike and walking paths everywhere. It is considered a vacation destination and is filled with lovely, well cared for homes and streets. Now, the island has returned to its original form of 3 separate islands. In the process, most of the harbors were destroyed and its boats were heavily damaged or simply carried out to sea. Most of the storm walls and dikes broke and all the streets were flooded.


Here are some pictures we took last fall.























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Here are some pictures from various news sources of what it looked like after the storm.

Flooded streets..


What is left of the harbor...


One of the roads between the towns....


Destroyed Vineyard....

Some of the locals have said that the people who own property there are simply walking away from it and have no plans to return. How sad.

The award winning loo

How many of you can actually say you've been a bathroom that's won an award? Well, when Katie and I were visiting the Tower of London, we came across the 2009 version. It was clean and well equipped, contrary to some of the toilettes we've been in in France.

Viaduct Millau

The day we drove to Roquefort, we actually had set out to see Europe's longest, tallest, bridge, the Viaduct Millau. We approached it from the valley and it is an amazing sight. We walked through the visitor center. The picture of the drawing with the Eiffel tower gives you an idea of how tall it really is. It's actually curved to avoid giving you the sensation of floating (really).

Then we drove up to the top and took a few more pictures before we went across and headed on our way. The views from the top and the bottom were much more impressive than going over it. The wind protection and side railings really take away the feeling of how high you really are when you're going over it.