On August 16, we had the chance to say goodbye to Didier (Dave's colleague at the University of Orléans and the main reason we came to France in the first place) and his family in style when he invited us to come flying with him. He flies small planes as a hobby and belongs to a club that owns a few planes that its members can reserve (the "club" is called an association in France, after a well-known 1901 French law that established the right to form nonprofits with very little restriction. There are now over a million of these "associations loi 1901" in France.)
The plane we flew, which Didier is checking here pre-flight, was a four-seater. So that meant splitting into two flights: One Didier and one Hunter adult, along with one child from each family, per flight. (Sabine stayed home along with Marguerite, their 3-year-old daughter.) With Dave weighing in at a whopping 94 kilos according to our bathroom scale, thanks no doubt to a little too much good French food and a little too little exercise over the course of the year, the Dave Flight would include Cyprien and Betsy, the two smallest children. And, Didier added to Dave with a smirk, maybe you should fly second, when there will be less gas in the plane.
Here are shots first of Gabriel and Molly, then Cyprien and Betsy, before their respective flights. Gabriel and Cyprien are the same ages as Molly and Betsy, but fortunately for us, the boys are a lot bigger than the girls, which meant that each of them had stepped up to the next larger size of bicycle and so Didier loaned us their old ones. (Cyprien's old bike is the one on which
Betsy first learned to ride by herself, and Gabriel's old bike is the one Molly rode on her four-day and three-night
trip along the Loire with Cricket.)
The next few shots are of Didier as pilot with the Loire River in the background and the famous chateaus of
Cheverny and
Chambord, respectively. Alas, we never got around to visiting Cheverny, and only
Dave got to see Chambord. These sites joined the long list of things we had hoped to see in France but did not because we simply ran out of time. Also on the list: The chateau at Versailles, a chateau under construction using medieval techniques at Guédelon, Chartres, the Massif Central, Provence, Corsica and the Mediterranean coast, and the list goes on. Clearly, we'll just have to go back sometime.
After the flights, we all drove back for a barbecue at Didier and Sabine's house, which is always a treat because they are pretty serious about wine and Didier is also a very good cook. As always, saying goodbye was difficult, but we hope to see Didier again fairly soon, as he has plans to come back to Penn State early in 2009. He and Sabine have even floated the possibility that they would bring the whole family to the US for a few weeks, so we're keeping our fingers crossed for that.
On August 16, we had the chance to say goodbye to Didier (Dave's colleague at the University of Orléans and the main reason we came to France in the first place) and his family in style when he invited us to come flying with him. He flies small planes as a hobby and belongs to a club that owns a few planes that its members can reserve (the "club" is called an association in France, after a well-known 1901 French law that established the right to form nonprofits with very little restriction. There are now over a million of these "associations loi 1901" in France.)
The plane we flew, which Didier is checking here pre-flight, was a four-seater. So that meant splitting into two flights: One Didier and one Hunter adult, along with one child from each family, per flight. (Sabine stayed home along with Marguerite, their 3-year-old daughter.) With Dave weighing in at a whopping 94 kilos according to our bathroom scale, thanks no doubt to a little too much good French food and a little too little exercise over the course of the year, the Dave Flight would include Cyprien and Betsy, the two smallest children. And, Didier added to Dave with a smirk, maybe you should fly second, when there will be less gas in the plane.
Here are shots first of Gabriel and Molly, then Cyprien and Betsy, before their respective flights. Gabriel and Cyprien are the same ages as Molly and Betsy, but fortunately for us, the boys are a lot bigger than the girls, which meant that each of them had stepped up to the next larger size of bicycle and so Didier loaned us their old ones. (Cyprien's old bike is the one on which Betsy first learned to ride by herself, and Gabriel's old bike is the one Molly rode on her four-day and three-night trip along the Loire with Cricket.)
The next few shots are of Didier as pilot with the Loire River in the background and the famous chateaus of Cheverny and Chambord, respectively. Alas, we never got around to visiting Cheverny, and only Dave got to see Chambord. These sites joined the long list of things we had hoped to see in France but did not because we simply ran out of time. Also on the list: The chateau at Versailles, a chateau under construction using medieval techniques at Guédelon, Chartres, the Massif Central, Provence, Corsica and the Mediterranean coast, and the list goes on. Clearly, we'll just have to go back sometime.
After the flights, we all drove back for a barbecue at Didier and Sabine's house, which is always a treat because they are pretty serious about wine and Didier is also a very good cook. As always, saying goodbye was difficult, but we hope to see Didier again fairly soon, as he has plans to come back to Penn State early in 2009. He and Sabine have even floated the possibility that they would bring the whole family to the US for a few weeks, so we're keeping our fingers crossed for that.
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment