French Food

We visited McDonald's more in Paris than anywhere on the trip. Sounds like a travisty but it was readily available and the kids love it. The great thing about getting out into the country side is that McDonalds and Starbucks are not on every street corner. The first night in Epernay we ate in a former bank. Frank hunted for accomodation while the bank looked after me and the boys. They had fabulous French Champagnes by the glass...

Our second night we ate in an equally good restaurant and while I was trying to explain to the non English speaking waitress that Frank wanted his steak well done (ne tartare pas)a lady at the table next to us helped me. We ended up having dinner dinner together (and actually sat near each other at the bank the previous night). Grazyna was a lovely lady who just started working for family who owns a number of French Champagne houses. After a great evening we planned to meet Grazyna at her work place the next day.

We tried some lovely champagnes with Grazyna and then had to decide to either go to one of the family's champagne houses in Reims or to a Champagne castle with Grazyna. The Chateau was 2 hours drive from Epernay and as we had had to drop the car off in Reims we decided to go there. We were hosted by Manu at Le Maison de Martel.

Dropping the car back at the Hertz was a whole other adventure (finding your way back into a major city where they drive on the other side of the road and the road rules are quite different). We opted to drop it off without filling it up first as we couldn't handle the stress of trying to find a petrol station; we were charged a hefty penalty for this. We have now been in Reims a couple of days - the first day spent visiting Champagne houses:

Who needs a wine rack?

Europe can be exhausting. Especially without a plan...yesterday we decided, over breakfast with a man from Germany, to go to Berlin instead of Brussels. While we can do this without a fixed plan it means finding a new route and accomodation etc.

Today has been a recharge day - doing nothing! This morning I put on the washing and went out to get breakfast. It was lovely! I had to speak French and everyone tried to help me at the bakery and the coffee place. It was 8:00am and in the coffee place I pointed to empty champagne glasses and asked if people usually have champagne with breakfast. I was told 'ofcourse' so when in Rome...