France Day 4 - Countrymen and le Cygne

We tried to find a hotel by driving around the spots marked on the map but failed, so we parked on a tiny street and set out on foot. We finally found one called Le Cygne, and when we walked into the reception, we saw a Chinese lady! We were able to speak Mandarin to her, and she showed us into a beautiful room on the second floor. We had to haul our stuff up a winding staircase since there was no elevator in the old apartment. The room was decorated with pretty pastel colours, a large mirror, a high ceiling with a chandelier, and two huge windows that open up all the way to let in fresh air from the street below.

This is the tiny entrance to the garage
of the hotel, only a few inches wider
than our car O_O

 

Creeping on the man with baguettes xD

Giant chocolate macaroon, mmm...

 After we settled in, we went for a walk by the river and had dinner.

 

Strange carrot soup-like substance
served before the meal in a tiny bowl

Smoked salmon and, for whatever
reason, a slab of butter

Terrine of some sort, and pear slices.
There are pears everywhere in France.

I forget what this is called but it's a
pastry sort of thing.

Fish, obviously. It wasn't very good.

Lamb.

Duck breast and more pear slices.

Yay sorbet! <3

France Day 3 - Hospices

We had lunch back in the old town of Beaune, and then in the afternoon went to tour the , which is an old hospital that’s been restored and turned into a museum. In one of the rooms all the beds have been refurnished in their original places, along the sides of a long hall where the poor could come for medical treatment. At the end of the hall was a chapel, separated from the “unclean” by wooden barriers and velvet curtains, all under a high vaulted ceiling painted with coloured patterns. In some of the other, smaller rooms were the quarters of the rich, a room for those nearing death, a pharmacy and laboratory, and a kitchen. 

Courtyard

Some beds plus a scary wax nurse

The chapel at the end

More scary nurses and their fake
food in the kitchen area

Mixing stuff for drugs ;D

Bottles of herbs and chemicals

France Day 3 - Scrutiny

For dinner, we picked a restaurant that looked nice and was decorated cutely. Inside, we were served by a cheerful woman in tights and a bouncy miniskirt. She didn’t know any English and was glad to find that I understood a little French. There were no menus, but only framed chalkboards and slates on the walls listing out the different options in curly handwriting.

After we ordered, the lady kept watching us from behind the cash register. When my dad ordered a glass of white wine and she brought it, she got herself a glass of water to demonstrate to him how to smell the aroma of the wine in the glass, then sip it and run it around in the mouth to get the whole taste. While we were eating, she would stand about a metre away from our table, intently watching our reactions to every dish.

I tried a drink called Kir Royal, which is made from a sparkling white wine with blackberry liquor in it. It comes out a pleasant magenta colour and is sweet but rather strong.

Free bread stuff

Kir Royal on the left

Some quiche-like thing

Terrine, which is basically duck pâté 

Boeuf Bourguignon with pasta

Duck breast and a pile of potatoes

Poire au vin (dessert)

France Day 2 - Mustard Morning

It was warm and sunny out today, and I slept relatively well despite the slight jetlag. Our hotel room was rather stuffy, since the bathroom has no fan to ventilate and the humidity from the showers just sort of stayed in the room. The one window was massive, though, and opened up completely without any screens or barriers, so you could lean out of the window and look down the street if you wanted. 

We packed up our stuff and went out into the city. We had coffee/hot chocolate at a coffee shop with a very typical European feel. It was very expensive, but the hot chocolate was rich and yummy and came with a mountain of whipped cream. It’s called Chantilly here, what a nice name :3

Lol my mom.

We walked around the city to take pictures in the daylight. It was much busier today, as all the stores were open and people were out and about. As with any city, I suppose, there were homeless people on the street corners and in doorways, some of them with dogs keeping them company. I had McDonald’s for lunch just for the lulz, and got 2 macaroons from the McCafé. My parents had a toasted open-faced sandwich from a street side bakery. One thing I’ve noticed about France: people actually walk down the street holding baguettes—one, or two, or an armload. The stereotype is true.

Since being in Dijon is an experience never complete until you get some of their famous moutarde, we went to the Maille store and got like 14 bottles of mustard to give to people as gifts and also for ourselves. Then we collected out car from the hotel parking and went on our way. 

France Day 2 - Boeuf Bourguignon

We arrived at the town of Beaune, and we had lunch at a small cafe/diner. The sun came out and it was warm out but slightly breezy so we sat inside at a booth. On the road between Dijon and Beaune, we passed through numerous tiny towns/villages along the “Route des Grands Crus” nestled within acre after acre of vineyards. Once, we stopped and got out to take pictures, where the sun was warm and there were sounds of birds everywhere. The air smelled of fresh earth and living things, something I haven’t smelled since last summer in Canada, and everything was still. We saw a couple of big mansions here and there among the fields and villages as well.

At this diner, I was able to practice my French on the lady serving us. She was curious about us, since we were Asian and foreigners and I was oddly able to somewhat converse in French. We ordered food to share, so when she brought the plate of salad, she gave us 3 forks. Then I was like, “Est-ce qu’on peut avoir des petites assiettes?” And she stared at me like O_o. And then I was like, “Er...nous voulons partager?” And she was like, “Mais vous avez une assiette?!?”indicating the salad plate. Finally I got her to understand that I wanted “les autres assiettes” so it was all cool.

the famous boeuf bourguignon

France Day 2 - Steaks and Fire

We checked into a hotel room just outside the old town that had a double bed plus a bunk bed. I love bunk beds!

We had dinner at a restaurant called le Piqu’Boeuf (I think), which had a central theme of cow. Even the door handle was a big cow horn. Inside, there was a gigantic fireplace burning what looked like the trunks of small trees or entire branches of a large one. After we ordered, we realized that there was a grill in front of the flames, and a chef was making all the meat and stuff there, as well as large baked potatoes. 

Escargots in garlic cream

Andouillette and baked potato

Green salad w/ foie gras

Chicken in mustard sauce + fries

Local cheeses and spiced bread

Crème brûlée

France Day 1 - Kerfuffle

We got off the plane at Charles de Gaulle airport in Paris sometime in the morning. I didn’t really get any rest on the flight because there were these two extremely noisy children sitting right in front of me. The food was pretty good though; I thought it was much better than the Air Canada food I’ve tasted. When were lining up for customs at the airport, we heard a “security announcement” regarding a grey suitcase that had been left unattended in some area of the terminal. When we were waiting for our baggage claim, we saw that there were a large number of customs personnel and even a few soldiers in camouflage with rifles standing around. Travellers were cleared out of the area and kept gathered at a safe distance. We only had to wait a very short time before they gave the all clear and we could proceed into the terminal. I caught a glimpse of the questionable suitcase, or what was left of it, as officials were piling pieces of it into a large plastic bag. I guess they cut it up to see what was inside.

Some dude sleeping, and a coffee
vending machine

France Day 1 - Car and Driver

We got our rental car from the airport, and spent a little time in the parking lot with its tiny parking spaces trying to figure out the car. On a side note, the car parked beside ours was a Panda. Our car does some cool things like auto parking brake, mirrors that swivel themselves in when you leave the car, and windshield wipers that automatically turn on when it starts to rain. There’s also a DVD drive, assumably so you can watch videos on the little screen in the dashboard, and also what looks like a phone function.

We had a GPS that we borrowed from one of my dad’s relatives, but while I was still trying to figure out how it worked, we got a little bit lost just getting out of the airport. The roads were overlapping and strange, and we even managed to accidentally go into an underground parking lot and had to navigate our way out. Oops.

Once we were on the highway, we drove a little way but got stuck in traffic where the police had temporarily blocked off the road. When things cleared, we drove past an accident where a car had completely flipped over, and bags of groceries were scattered at the side of the road---I saw squished onions everywhere.

As we drove on the highway, we passed by stuff too quickly for me to actually get it on camera, but I saw some interesting things like trees with slender branches and puffs of moss or vines hanging from them like something out of Avatar, three large ruined buildings that looked straight out of the Medieval era, and a random little tree by the side of the highway all by itself sporting beautiful pink flowers.