Day 4 - Antiquing + Honfleur

 I set my alarm for 7am so we could get a lot more in today than we did yesterday. We managed to get out of bed closer to 8am. We spent the morning preparing for our day: googling maps to our destinations, checking out restaurants and drinking coffee. All things that we could have done during the 5 months leading up to this trip. Anyway, once we got everything sorted we headed out to the grocery store to grab food for the apartment. We grabbed stuff from Carrefour and the boulangerie next door. Croissants for breakfast? YESS. Except that’s not all we had, we also had baguette sangwidges with the meat and cheese we bought from the g-store.

We probably left around 11:30am. First destination was a rando Antique market in nowhere Saint Pierre land. It was about an hour away and our first stop before heading to a medieval town called Honfleur. I was driving again and getting frustrated here and there when the GPS would get the roundabout exit wrong. In France there are barely any stop lights, they use roundabouts, which I think are better for reducing traffic jams, but are a bit intimidating when you’re new to the land. Imagine approaching a yield sign, with a grass island in the middle and all these Irratic French drivers whipping by in a loop. You need to wait for a safe moment to merge then you need to be alert of your exits. The roundabout is a tight donut so the exits come up quickly, so if you’re not local and need to read the signs for direction, it’s very scary. Sometimes you end up staying in the donut and going in circles til you know where to get off. Kind of funny but still. You need to act fast and get out of the loop safely. I realized that one of the features on the car we rented is probably meant for roundabouts and quick merges/exits: You just need to tap the ticker lever and it makes your signals blink for a short period of time instead of pressing the lever all the way down to indicate direction and then consciously turning it off. Ver convenient when making swift moves in a roundabout.

We made it to the town where “Marché a la Brocante” the antique market was, in St. Pierre sur Dives. We pulled up to this old building, it could have been a barn. There was an old swing set outside and other random bits of… well not exactly garbage but just “things” in the yard. It was definitely a bit creepy because there were only 2 other cars there and we were in this little quiet town. We totally could have gotten murdered and no one would know where we were. The door was open, actually I don’t even think there was a door at all, and we walked it. There was a man standing in there, smoking a cigarette and looking at his stuff. He reminded me of the French clown on Parlez-Moi but without makeup. Not that he looked like a hobo, he just had a similar face and voice. 

This was a typical antique market in terms of tons of books, artwork, "bric a brac", the odd eerie wedding dress… but there we lots of thick cobwebs everywhere and I saw a giant pointy spider. It felt like I was in a huge version of my parents’ cellar, with big thick webs in the corners, so I had to walk around with my arms tight to my chest, my shoulders up, trying not to look at the webs in case there was something terrifying in them. There were dry old leaves in some of the webs and on the floor, lots of dust too. It also reminded me of Frightenstein. It was pretty cool, but not too much I wanted to take home.

See the big spider? It was big. But who wants to touch those books?

There was definitely some cool artwork, but nothing we loved enough to want to buy and ship home (because how do you travel with a big painting?). There was an area in the back that had plates and old metal wash basins (full of gross stagnant water) and the odd bowl full of cigarette butts. Every time I saw a wedding dress – there were like 3 - I kept thinking of a scary story I read as a kid, from the book Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark which had illustrations like this: 

These are friggin scary drawings.

We loved that nude painting in the upper right. She had a great face. I also kept picturing Barbara filling those dresses and coming to life as a crusty corpse (Beetlejuice reference in case you didn't know):

This. In my head. BARBARAAA?! ADAM!

This man didn’t speak any English, but Jamie did a good job communicating in French and the man was even impressed with how good he spoke it. We told him we were on vacation. I looked at a set of Russian nesting dolls and a cute little wooden box – pefect for jewelry. It reminded me of one my nanny had (great grandmother), and it was marked 15 Euros. The dolls 6. Jamie had his eye on a rusty old lantern too. Man told us the wooden box was from “Bretagne”, and it took a while (actually it took him grabbing a map and pointing out to what the eff he was talking about) for us to get it. He kept saying “Bretagne! Bretagne!” rolling the “r”s in the back of his throat. It was funny and we are dumb. The box was from Bretagne, a region to the west of Normandy. It has lots of Celtic and Irish influence since it is just below Ireland. We ended up getting those items (because we didn’t drive all the way there for nothing) and Man threw in a giant wooden rosary as a cadeau for me. He mimed out (put his hands together like in prayer, and walked forward and went “aawwwww!!” like he was singing at church) that it was used by priests in BRETAGNE as well. We paid 30 Euros for the lot (box, nesting dolls and lantern). Sweet of him to throw in that giant rosary, I know lots of vavos and nonnas will be quite jealous of it. It was cool being in there, all the old books and things, dust and spider webs…we were the only people in the building, looking around at all this old stuff, we got to meet a friendly French man and he even gave me a little gift. Cute experience.

My stuff. Not sure what I'll do with that huge rosary though. We don't really have the room above our bed for it...

The lantern. Turns out it was used on the French railway.

Many things. 

See? Cellar-styles.

I got nervous when I heard a big dog barking outside. I was picturing it mauling me as we left.

Large. Yuck, and full of gross water.

Oh yes I want some of those plates for my house.

What kid played with that chaulkboard? 

THIS KID! 

Butts.

Paintings probably worth a lot but what do we know?

Next stop: Honfleur. First let me tell you to make sure your GPS isn't set to "detour" or avoid tolls when you want to get somewhere fast in France. Somehow, the GPS took us along these what looked like one way streets, but they're not. They're just REALLY tight country roads. Luckily we only came across one or two cars going the opposite direction.. and you just need to squeeze to the side. But it's still nerve wracking and if it were at night I would definitely be crying. We found Honfleur eventually and parked in the giant parking lot full of cars. I had to drive on some tight city centre streets, but it was all good. I had no idea this town would be such a crazy tourist attraction. 

Approaching the main harbour.

I bought a bag of praline almonds. Eight Euros what the eff!

Anuzzer carousel! This played scary circus music.

This building was OLLDD. It reminded me of some sort of town square. I pictured the towns folk gathering for hangings.

There was a memorial plaque and bust for mister Champlain.

Hanged for treason, theft or adultery.

Old church type building, smelled good in there. I touched the wood, we are now one.

Big church. Europeans are so lucky to have these super old, historic churches to get married in.

zees one is called "Saint Deux dans la Rose".

MMM!

View from our cider drinking seats. The seagulls here sound like crazy screaming monkeys.

Lots of people. It's probably so crazy here in the summer.

These were the people in front of us on the train thing that took us through the streets. They were cracking up about the bumps and boob jiggles.

It was SO busy. It was beautiful and full of mideivel buildings and side streets, but it was just crawling with tourists. I know we are tourists but sometimes when there are that many people in such a beautiful place, it takes the magic away from it. There were lots of little boutique stores, places selling cider, and many many restaurants serving overpriced Normandy cuisine. I looked up one of the best restaurants and the internet directed me to "le tortue" (the turtle). Said it was reasonably priced and delicious. We found it around 2.30pm and went go go grab a seat since we were both hungry. The lady who worked there told us: "Service terminé".  UGH. We've learned that most restaurants are open for lunch hour, then closed for the late afternoon while you're supposed to be having coffee and sweets, and then they reopen for dinner. So if we wanted to eat at the tortue, we had to wait until 6.30pm. We were willing to do this so we just wandered the streets. Went into one of the big tourist attractions - a church made of wood. It was pretty and smelled like church and we took some photos and moved on.. Eventually we ended up on a patio with a bottle of cider. We were lucky enough to sit right on the harbour, it was a really nice view. But again, just lots and lots of people. There is one of those little train things that goes around the city and we figured that would be great for killing an hour. It was fun, but all the roads are cobblestone and the ride is really really bumpy. The ladies ahead of us were just dying laughing and I'm sure it was because their boobs were bouncing around like crazy. It was funny. Those tours aren't a good idea if you have a bad back, just so you know. After that tour we said fuggit about the restaurant and headed back to Courseulles for dinner. It's better being within walking distance of where you're staying so you can drink your face off. Kidding mom! I only drank half my face off.

We had dinner at Les Alizes across the street, recommended by our host. And it was damn good. Most restaurants have these combos you can get, where you pick your appetizer / main / cheese plate / and dessert/cafe. I got a warm chevre salad with a big ass pot of curry mussels. Jamie got the same salad and a steak with camembere sauce. I don't like that type of goat cheese that was on the salad, it kind of makes me gag and tastes like barn. Jamie likes it though. There was a table next to us of four older people. They all ordered this giant seafood "appetizer" and by the time they got through it and onto their mains, we were finishing dessert. That's how big it was. If I knew what to do with all those shells I might have gotten that too. But I'd be scared something would fling in jamie's eye and we'd have to call an ambulance. speaking of which, the man who was eating his oysters and such thought he flung some in my eye because he cracked one open just as I was rubbing my eye. He looked shocked and scared but I assured him I was ok.

So good. But so offensive looking.

Cheese after dinner. See? we do it wrong at home. We graze on cheese before dinner, they eat a bit of cheese after dinner to cleanse the pallet before dessert. 

That was day 4. Oh yes there was a drunk Frenchman walking around the harbour singing loudly in French, stumbling about. Just like a cartoon!

Food Note

Can I also please note that I think my clothes are feeling tighter already. You know, I'm not gonna say no to the awesome food here. I'd much rather suffer when I get back with a strict regimen than miss out on all the goodness France has to offer. So if you see me roll into the office Monday, just know that I enjoyed every bite.

I totally could have brought my runners/running gear. I saw some guys running so I wouldn't have looked like a crazy person if I went for a run. Now I know.

Day 3 - D-Day Beaches

I didn’t sleep well last night. It’s hard getting used to the time change, even though I had a full night’s sleep the night before and had a full day with no naps. I probably fell asleep at like 2am or something. Woke up at 10am, which, although we’re on vacation, it’s not ideal when you want to see lots of things. This happened last year in Paris. The first few days we were up late and slept in because of jet lag. It sort of limits what you want to do. We missed out on Versailles because on the day we wanted to go, we woke up way too late and it wouldn’t have made sense for us to go all the way there for a short visit. Anyway, we were both up around 10 and by the time we left the apartment it was close to 1pm. We doddled, I wrote about yesterday and we drank coffee. We meant to go to the grocerystore around the corner but it closed at 1pm. Most places are either just open Sunday mornings or not open at all. Remember that if you ever come to France. Sunday is actually a day of rest here.

On the agenda today was visiting the d-day beaches. Utah, Omaha, Gold and Sword Beaches. But we needed to grab some food to eat along the way. The stupid GPS decided to work so it took us to the nearest Carrefour to get groceries, which online said it was open til 8. MMMMMM It was closed. So we got directions for another market. (I drove all day today. I was really nervous at first, mainly because I don’t know this car… but got used to it after a while.) The GPS took us to some small town (village?) but the road to the market was blocked with… a market! So we stopped and got cheese, grapes and cherry tomatoes. We needed a baguette (naturally) and asked them where the boulangerie was. They directed us to one that was closed. Yeah thanks, Marcel. So we made our way to Utah Beach with some camembere, a hard chevre with red pepper flakes, and fruit. Yum yum.

I think it took us about an hour to get there. It was a combination of driving through little villages, tight country roads and “regular” highway roads. When we got to the city Utah beach is in, we found a Boulangerie/Patisserie that was open so we grabbed a baguette and chocolate croissant. I axed the lady what was dans the other pastry (not like that, obv I spoke French) and she said “chousson”(sp?) I had no idea what that meant so I passed. She probably told me to eff-off. What is that anyway? Chousson? I was hoping it was something savoury, I wasn’t exactly in the mood for sweet. The lady wasn’t all that pleasant actually. Maybe she doesn’t like Americans (this is an American memorial beach and maybe thought we were American tourists) or maybe she was just a crusty baguette who hated everyone. ANYWAY, we moseyed on down to Utah beach and had a picnic on a WWII bunker sunk in the sand. Not on purpose, it wasn’t til I stepped away and looked at the concrete slab that I realized it was probably a friggin bunker. I kind of felt bad about it… but.. dayum it didn’t LOOK like a bunker when we approached it. Onwards. This was a large beach. Lots of people around, chilling on blankets, walking in the water collecting whatever they collect, and just playing at the beach. I didn’t see any big war-ish things on the beach or in the water so we went on to our next destination: Omaha. (you can click on the photos to view them larger).

Creepy soldier at the gift shop near Utah beach.

remind me to photoshop that face on this last supper - but it needs to look like a carving.

picnic bunker

Utah Beach. YOOJ.

Omaha was pretty busy, so was Utah actually. Lots of camper vans. We had a little pitcher of cider and fries on a patio. The man who served us looked like a wrinkly old skinny rock star. He approached us smoking a cigarette. That was pretty funny and authentic. I probably would have gotten a cool print of the NYC subway map using his wrinkles if I slapped some ink on his face and pressed it on some canvas.

Delicious cider served by Mock Jagger.

We decided to check out the museum there at Omaha. It was a typical war museum, with artifacts and creepy/hot mannequins in big diorama ramas. We got to watch a short film on Omaha and D-Day. Very fascinating. (Some little blonde French toddler strolled in like he owned the place, trying to climb up on the benches and staring at everyone. You know when they walk around, shoulders back, trying to intimidate you? We’re trying to watch a movie ugh!!!) 500,000 soldiers were sent to Normandy for the invasion. Isn’t that insane??! I was looking at those soldiers faces in the film thinking.. you probably had no idea you were gonna be dead in a few hours. I bet most of those guys didn’t make it. So crazy. This museum was all about the American invasion, I’d like to check out the museum at Juno Beach here to see if there is a Canadian film. After Omaha, we went to Gold.

In the museum.

Crazy artillery shizz.

Ok, to be honest, I was kind of not looking forward to the next beaches. I thought they’d all be the same. We had to pass through Port en Bessin to get to Gold beach. IT was pretty cool seeing my family’s name everywhere. Bessin, the “Mediterranean” name. Cooooooool. We came across Arromaches, which had an outlook post where you could go up and take photos of the spectacular view. And let me tell you, it was spectacular. We were high up on a cliff so you could see the small town below, the beautiful waves coming in and people down at the beach. Even a pair on hourseback. Very pretty. After absorbing all of that, we headed ‘home’. We actually pulled into Gold beach first but decided.. meh.. let’s just go back to the apartment.

These photos don't do it justice at all.

I was really high. Above the water I mean.

Instagram prettifies it.

Let me tell you, the weather right now is perfect. There is a nice breeze happening, I can hear sea birds “bikaw-ing” and the odd car pass by. Jamie is napping and I’m sitting here on the balcony, writing (probably finishing this bottle of wine I opened if he doesn’t wake up soon) and watching the sun go down. I’m tempted to open that bag of salt and vinegar chips I bought but maybe we’ll go downstairs and grab a bite of some French cuisine later. If I can eat local seafood every day while I’m here, I’ll be one happy gurl. Des moules est frites again? Oui, merci. Ok maybe hold the frites, I had some today already but yes.. moules. MUSSELS!

 

this is how i walk around. No one bothers me.

Mom and Dad, I wish you could be here to experience all of this. In fact, I wish my whole family could be here. Maybe one day?

Bon nuit!

Day 2 - Meeting the fam + exploring the area

Our alarm went off at 10am. I could have slept longer. (did I say this already). The hot water wait I said this already.

We made it to lunch after a quick (hot) shower just after noon at a place called la cremaillere - it's right along the beach. I was told that my (great great) uncle will be waiting for us in a grey Citroen in the parking lot. I could feel a lump in my throat growing as we got closer to the restaurant. I kept telling myself to keep it together, Kennedy. When we saw them, we knew it was them (car) and I just wanted to cry. It took all my strength not to. In fact, I just had to not look at them for a few minutes and think of stupid things like shoes and chocolate bars. I was just so happy that I finally got to meet my relatives in France, and he is the closest thing to my great grandfather and grandfather (since they've both passed away). I also kind of felt like I got a glimpse of my Pépé through his brothers eyes omagad I can't talk about it anymore. They were both so happy to meet us, and we felt the same.. I've always wanted to get to France for my roots and I finally made it happen, that is an overwhelming feeling. Anyway, once I distracted myself enough to function, we went in and had lunch.

Bulots - Snails from the sea. Specific to Normandy. I tried one. That is all. My favourite part was Andre preparing one for me, taking it out of the shell with strings of slime all over it, stuck to his fingers and the shell. He kept looking up at my face with a smirk, seeing my reaction as he got it ready. It was funny. 

Salmon tartare - Jamie's plate. Yum.

Pork confit - YESSSSSS. I'm eating frites here like nobodies biz. I feel like they are better for you in France. Don't burst my bubble. MJ you would have enjoyed these ribs.

We had a wonderful chat - we managed to speak some French and they spoke some English with us. Not a problem communicating at all. We drank some fantastic French white wine – which I have been assured that when we go to their place on Wednesday, we will drink ALOT more of – and learned a lot about my family's roots and about Normandy. Guess what. My great X4 grandfather was captured by Napoleon and used as a soldier. What the--.. I also learned that thisgreatX4 grandfather also walked very far (from Germany to Spain) and French people have very good veins in their legs. 

Look how cute we are. Apparently I don't have Bessin toes because my second toe isn't the same length as my big toe (I'm ok with that, sorrry!). Andre pointed that out to me with his cane and cracked up. We had the best lunch with Andre and Nicole and I'm looking forward to more stories on Wednesday. I've got more to say about the family but I'll write more about this day later, when I don't have a million things running through my mind.

After lunch we walked around Courseulles, it's not a big city. We went down to the beach and dock. There were lots of famlies around doing French-family things. Picking shells and kelp from the beach and having a fun French time, speaking French n stuff. Kids are much cuter when they speak French.  There is a fresh fish market full of.. yep.. FISH and shellfish and all that shizz. The crabs were still alive and looking all crabby at me. They have no idea what's gonna happen to them next. I like the smell of the air here, it smells like fish but not in a bad way, and ocean. Love. There is a cute ice cream/gelato/waffle/"chichi" stand that looks like a little carousel. Chichis are like churros - fried dough logs coated in sugar. MM! We walked down passed a heated salt water pool, walked through a neighbourhood and perhaps passed "the projects" but were not ghetto like you'd think. only un petit peut ghetto. Also, a kid on a bike who looked like he could have been a brat said "bonjour" to me. That made me happy.

See the low tide? It goes out so fast and so far so much so that if boats don't come back on time, they're effed.

If I knew what to do with this fresh fish, I would have bought some. 

I don't even care that they are all looking at me, trying to intimidate me.

cooooool.

I loved the inside of this boat, so woody and perfectly nautical.

see? low tide, that boat is effed.

We made our way through a market area, looked kind of touristy. Stopped at the supermarket for a few things but not enough things because we have to go back this morning before our trek out to the US d-day beaches. Their market chain is called Carrefour, it's kind of fancy. 

We wanted to check out Juno beach since it's right here. It's important for us as Canadians. There are Canadian flags and plaques and memorials. They have a few bunkers still in the sand, several rest areas that have info on plaques and a museum which we'll check out today. There are also a bunch of military machine pieces along the way for you to touch and look at.

Look at that damage. Bombs.

This was on our neighbourhood walk, a real old French couple being naturally cute!!!

Bunker. A ruin. What the hell happened that day at this spot. So many scary things.

Damn kids! I shook my fist for all of you.

I got an awesome clam shell which I plan on using to put my rings in. Not this one OBVIOUSLY.

Jamie in the background. You really need proper boots to trek through that squishy sea weed stuff. Sometimes it reeks. I stepped in a sinking clay spot and got my sandals all covered in grey sludge. It was delightful.

Another bunker. "Cosy's Bunker". This one was pretty big and you could go in it.

This part made me cry. There were these concrete things with plaques all over them. With names, dates, memorials and messages. Lots of messages from cities back home. I couldn't take it anymore and friggin cried. It's a very emotional place to be, whether you have a personal connection to war or not. SO much went on at this beach and so many young men died to end an awful war. It's crazy. I was just a damn cry face on Saturday, maybe it was the Melatonin. Yeah that's it, the Melatonin and booze. But I felt much better afterwards though.

Dinner was at the place below our flat. We had pizza and steak tartare and farmer's cider. I love being in the land of cider. (we're in the land of cider? Homer in the land of chocolate montage) Tried watching Cabin in the Woods..zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz. Just tell me what happens in the end please. What's happening? Anyway, that was Saturday, our first full day in Courseulles Sur Mer.

Day 1 - Getting to Courseulles Sur Mer

This is going to be brief because we have to go meet relatives for lunch in less than an hour abd we're not ready. In fact, theres is no hot water! The host is coming by. This should be interesting. I should have kept up with my French.

The flight was not the greatest. First, they make you walk by business class when you get on the plane. So you get to see all these people in these awesome pods, getting ready for an awesome relaxing flight which they can properly lay down and sleep through. There were lots of kids in business class! What the hell. They don't even know how good they have it. The seats weren't as crammed or bad as Transat or some other cheap carriers (we flew British Airways.). The headrests had these things that pulled out on either side to support your head. Better than nothing. Also they gave us a blanket, pillow and toothbrush (thank gad, there's nothing worse than red-eye flight gundge mouth). I took Melatonin to help me sleep and drank some wine. They weren't cheap with the wine, they gave us like three of those airplane bottles. It only helped me fall asleep only to be woken up by the worst turbulence ever. Ugh. It was a huge plane, and I always thought bigger planes didn't feel the bumps as much as smaller planes. Either I was wrong or these were huge bumps. I mean the plane was being tossed around. At that point I hated my life. Jamie slept through it all which mean he got to drive three hours from Paris to Courseulles. I would have preferred to sleep on the flight. It's impossible to sleep upright in those chairs. I tried watching Battleship but it was garb.

pre flight drinks to numb the pain. didn't work.

free stuff. a pillow/blanket/headphones/toothbrush

We landed in London for a three hour layover. It was fine. It was cute being in London and hearing all of them speak Londonese. Heathrow is basically a shopping mall. Now you know. We got an Americano and two bottles of water from Starbucks. Fourteen POUNDS. That's the last time I buy Starbucks in the UK.

flying over the UK

Heathrow airport. Basically a big mall that smells good with great washrooms.

The flight from London to Paris was fine. I didn't care because I just wanted to be here already. The plane flew quite low to the ground so it was nice flying over the English channel, seeing all the boats and the coast of France come up. It was awesome actually. Beautiful escarpments and cliffs. Can't wait to see them up close.

I thought that city in the distance was Paris. It wasn't.

Picking up the rental was a breeze. Paris Orly airport is pretty straight forward. Now, getting out of that airport and onto the correct highway, well that's a little difficult. Especially when your piece of shit GPS doesn't have reception and you don't have any proper maps or sense of direction. We were lost for about 15 minutes, but finally we sucked it up and turned Jamie's data roaming on to access maps. It cost us about 60 bucks, but desperate times..

We got on the right highway (by fluke, I had no idea how to navigate, but words fell out of my mouth and we ended up on the right path). The highway is just like Ontario highways, but with tolls and less signs. The scenery is about the same, except for the odd CASTLE on the right. Everyone tailgates and no one presses the brake unless necessary. Also motorcycles just weave like it's nobodies biz and no one cares. In fact, cars make room for them to weave. wtf. THREE HOURS LATER we find the flat and get settled. I'm thankful the sun was still up for our drive or we would have been royally faulked up the wah-zoo. Jamie drove the entire way because I was a zombie and probaly would have gotten us killed, if Jamie hadn't as he drove 150 km/hr!!! ("what? everyone drives fast"?! ) FML.

mmmm!

view from balcony. It smells like the sea, fresh, crisp and salty.

Went for dinner at a local restaurant. It's pure seafood here. Which is great for me but bad for Jamie since he is allergic. I had fantastic mussels in a creamy garlic sauce. A mountain of them. He had a sangwidge and fries. Normandy is popular for it's cider so I had a mug of some. It was delish and got me drunk since I was so tired and famished. Service was shit and I think they hated us because our French was shit but what are you gonna do?

After dinner it was about 10pm our time and we were ready for bed. I took a nice hot shower and left Jamie with freezing cold water. I felt bad for him because all he wanted to do was take a hot shower and go to bed. Turned out the hot water tank thing was bruck and we had to get the guy to come fix it. He did the following morning and all was well.

We woke up at 10am - I could have slept longer but we had to meet my (great-great aunt and uncle at a restaurant around the corner, and our hot water situation wasn't fixed yet). It ended up getting fixed by the nice man who owns the place and we made it to lunch. Which was so great, I will remember it forever. More on that later.