Dear Diary,
The picture on the right is me hanging out inHonfleur. Our room was on the fourth floor of a very old 15th century house. It was two rooms deep and one room wide and had an ancient and beautiful wooden staircase running up through the center of the house. Not a lot of fun to drag luggage up and down but the view was great once we got there. It was magical at night with all the lights on and the streets empty of all but local folks. I really wondered how on earth they built bathroom plumbing into these ancient places. It was wonderful to see a place so old and so continuously inhabited. It actually looked like something from Disneyland--I guess they'd call it King Arthurland or something equally silly, but this place is absolutely real and every apartment is full of humans going about their daily lives. There was a restaurant on the first and second floors across the street and the kitchen full of copper pots and bustling chefs was on the second floor. The dining room and the sidewalk tables were below and we could watch diners come and go.
For our dinner we found shops and got a wonderful saucisson with nuts in it (saucisson are French sausages, very like thin salamis but much nicer and in different flavors)some fresh bread and a fantastic little soft fresh cheese and picknicked while looking out our window on the first night we were there. We hated to leave but...
Giverny called and we answered, two days in Monet's 'hometown'. We stayed at Au Coin des Artistes, which was where--back in the day, a bunch of the artists who came with hopes to work with Monet or like Monet, stayed. It was very special and again we were lucky and our room looked out on the quiet main street of Giverny which looks much like it did when Monet lived there--especially in the evening after the tour buses all left. This is me in Monet's garden. The gardens have been restored completely after they fell into rack and ruin for about forty years. It was amazing to see the lily ponds where he painted so many of his most famous works.
We went through Rouen on the way and saw the great cathedral which he also painted several times. In Rouen's narrow medieval streets we saw a stone marker which said basically: this is where Joan of Arc recanted her claims to be touched by God, but she was burned at the stake anyway. There is almost a cult of Joan of Arc here, she is much beloved and one of the patron saints of France and in every church there are statues of her.
We stayed in the area for two days and drove everywhere including to Les Andelys and Vernon. We hiked up to the fortress that Richard Lionheart built to guard the Seine from his arch rival Philippe August. Richard Couer de Leon, as he is known in France, loved Normandy and when he died his heart remained here. Literally, his heart is buried in the great cathedral in Rouen. There is a really beautiful stone casket with his likeness carved fullsized in stone in the cathedral and his feet rest on a very lovely little lion.
The returning crusaders were assigned here and they were fairly isolated and lonely up on this hilltop. They planted the seeds of flowers they had brought back from the crusades and to this day there are astonishing wildflowers in the meadows around the ruins and so many butterflies! The place was torn apart and the stones were taken to build monasteries but a lot of it remains and it is an absolute marvel to see and wonder how on earth they built it in just two years. And what a view! We saw barges and boats slowly and majestically moving to and from Paris and working their way around a hairpin bend below. The beautiful fields spread out on each side and you could see a little town below and hear the church bells and even conversations that drifted up the steep hillside to where we stood.
Next we head to Paris. After seeing the gardens we are off to see the paintings.
posted by Rocket Davis @ 9:16 AM
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