Holiday to France

(if you don’t know already, we went to France for the wedding of a friend)

journey
It took twenty five hours to drive down to Meslières, I don’t think I have ever been so tired in my life, goodness only knows how Sara managed to stay awake and drive for all that time. It was hard enough for me to stay awake to read the directions and make sure she was okay. During the last few hours it was so hard, my head just kept dropping and I kept dropping what I was holding. It was weird cos I’ve never felt like that before, I’ve never been that exhausted that my body just tries to shut down like that.

Anyway, after a couple of mishaps we eventually made it to Meslières, and, in the state that we were got introduced to about thirty people, the bride’s (Clémence) family and friends (French-style, with bises) who were there for the wedding, but we were told apparently French people don’t really use deodorant that much, so they mustn’t have minded us being such a mess. Then we all went to eat down at the salle where the wedding would be held, it was really nice, I just wish I hadn’t been so tired, I could barely concentrate on what anyone was saying, and it’s hard enough to understand French fully awake! Meslières, the village, is tiny and gorgeous, really rural and lovely.


wedding
That night me and my friend Al camped out in a neighbour’s garden in a tent under the stars. I’m really not usually a fan of camping at all (I hate bugs), but I was actually really comfortable and enjoyed it! I didn’t get up til about 1 the next day I think, it got soooooooo hot in the tent in the morning, the weather was gorgeous, but I was too tired and lazy to care.

Anyway, it was the big day for the happy couple. The ceremony was in the village hall, and then we went to the salle to celebrate. It was an amazing experience, I’d never been to a French wedding before and it’s just amazing. The food was great, lots of MEAT! I even got to try escargots, though I wasn’t too keen on them… but I tried and that’s the main thing. There was a band playing Irish music, cos James, the groom has Irish ancestors, they were really good, I think they were trying really hard to impress us English-speaking people with their English hehe. There were all kinds of crazy games, I did one which involved dancing around in partners, one wearing a sombrero, one wearing these weird shorts, then when you hear the whistle you have to swap what you’re wearing and the last pair to change is out. Was so funny. I even managed to hold conversations in French, though I couldn’t say too much, I did have conversations. It was really good to have such a good opportunity to practice my French in France with French people xD, none of them really spoke English, which was good. Anyway, it was an amazing night, was so tired at the end.


the day after
The day after the wedding we just hung around the village, most of the people who came left (except the legendary Gégé), we ate at the salle, went down to the river/stream/thing and stuff. We hung out at Clémence’s parents’ house in the evening, they were so hospitable and chilled out, it was amazing. Me and Al were then upgraded from the tents to a camping car, cos of everyone leaving.


Freiburg
On the Monday (23 Aug) we went to Freiburg in Germany with Clémence, James and the kids for the day, it was a really nice city, some interesting sites, including a certain statue… I hate sausage so (un)fortunately I didn’t eat any kind of Wurst, I did however get some gorgeous Swiss biscuits, nomnomnom. And Naima managed to find some sort of exotic flavour of Pringles that was also really nice xD. Had a bit of drama with Alfie laying down in the middle of the street cos Clémence wouldn’t buy him some toy he wanted, was so funny, all the people staring at him as they walked round him and some guy went up and poked him with his foot, haha. Anyway, another fun day, and another new country I’d never been to before. Before this trip the only places I’d ever been to outside the UK were France and Andorra, and now I’ve been to Belgium, Luxembourg, Germany and Spain too!


fin
The next day was when my friends had to leave to drive back to England, cos they were gonna stop off in Brugge to try and break the journey up and make it easier on Sara so she didn’t die. Was sad saying goodbye, there were tears! Anyway, then spent a while trying to sort out all my baggage, but couldn’t get it down to 20kg so thought I would just have to pay excess fees, but I didn’t care too much, cos there was nothing that could be done, cos it’s not exactly easy to pack your life into 20kg of luggage and 12kg of hand luggage. Anyway, I shall continue the rest in the next blog cos this marks to end of my French holiday and the beginning of my journey to my new life in Spain!