C'est la vie

Salut!

Second week of school down.  I would like to say that we are getting into a rhythm.  I suppose we are in a way. We have been here almost a month and it feels like we should be getting the hang of it, speaking French like natives and hanging out with all of our new friends.  Not really the case.  It's not a bad thing, it's just difficult to not have expectations and to not feel rushed.  I believe this is unrealistic, perhaps if we came in speaking decent french we would be closer to all those things but alas we did not.  So we plug on, continuing to nod and smile and say things like, "Je ne parle pas francais bien" which is probably not even correct.  Or "Je suis american"  Like anyone cares, they just have to ask if we found everything we needed at the grocery, because it's their job.

Having said that, it continues to be quite fun despite it's challenges and the feeling that everyone is laughing at us.

We went to Lyon to meet with some folks about getting residency and found this awesome park.  There were all these cool slides and climbing ropes and climbing holds.  The kids had a blast.  Being in the big city, we didn't stand out as much.  There were some Americans (perhaps Canadians) and a whole spectrum of people.  It was refreshing.

This last weekend we headed south to the Mediterranean sea.  It was an awesome trip.  We have been using AirBnB to find places to stay and it really gets you to some cool places.   Bob has a conference in Montpellier this week so that was the motivator but we thought that we would take advantage of some travel time.  

The first night we spent in a walled medieval city called Aigues Mortes, I believe that sort of translates to "Dead Water".  It is located in a giant marsh where there is lots of bird life and even more mosquito life.  Micah took it the hardest.

We spent the day at the beach where we proceeded to let Micah get pretty sunburned on top of his 50 bites....

The next night we spent in the city centre of Montpellier (that's how they spell it, along with the Brits).  The city was awesome, the view from the windows was entertainment enough.

And now, le fotos:

The drive down was full of these weird steamy castles.

This is how they get rid of the radioactive birds

There is no bluff that is not castled.

AirBnb dinner

I would have liked to get the fish pedicure, it was only 10 euros

Some cool ceramics, shout out to Oma

Jasper really wanted some salty peanuts

More cool ceramics, shoutout Dennise

Le petit chat de soir

 Le plage Espiguette

Kite surf-palooza

There are flamingos in these pix, we didn't stop to gape.

Montpellier

Don't be fooled, this was a low moment at the fountain.  Did I mention the AirBnB places are often pretty tricky to find?

I need to work on my videos.  This is a shout out to Mimi and the Strawberry music festival this weekend.  Banjo busking, even some Gillian Welch covers.

Any Supersucker fans?

Le petit dejeuner on the square

TGV is not all that

Back home sans Papa 

Fin

A plus!