We arrived by night - as pirates will - and so we did not discover the beauty of the village until the next morning. As soon as we walked through the door though, Stella who was waiting - and watching - showed us some of the treasures already available by night in the house : photos of a giant sea turtle (at least 2 meters long) laying eggs on a beach in French Guiana; photos of a baby sloth held in the arms of our absent host as well as hundreds of sea shells from all over the world, a HUGE, male, African beetle in a glass box (dead, thank goodness!), a real African machette and a tiny scorpio (6mm long - dead too) that the family had caught and put under tape on cardboard. Just like this one :
Stella and Mom came across it one evening when they were barefoot in the kitchen and took a picture with Mom's cell phone then tried to put it outside without killing it but...
... thems who is not pirates, got scared when it started scurrying VERY quickly under a cupboard and so thems squashed it! Oh, yeah, THEN they had the nerve to get a photo close up. But this baby was not 6mm long, nooooooo, more like an inch and a half long. Not something you want to meet down in the toe of your tennies in the morning, believe me! Unfortunately, we didn't see any others!
Next morning, we woke early, discovered the view from Mom's window then had breakfast on the terrace.
While waiting for Stella to wake up, we discovered other treasures in the house: colorful, plastic, toddler toys which kept us happy on the couch for hours!
Couch potato Pirates, we are!
Then Mom and Stella had a good balanced breakfast...
... and when Stella had had enough sugar to give her just the right morning boost, we blew soap bubbles in the garden - Yes, you can see the bubbles if you really try. Go on, try! They were like jewels in the sun!
That afternoon, we had lunch at the pool.
A pool lost in time : no bathing caps are necessary, shorts can be worn, there's hardly any chlorine in the chilly well water that fills it, so no sore eyes!
Kids can run and jump and....
... FLIP!
Or catch lizards on the rock walls or just watch other kids running and flipping and catching lizards. And all that at the foot of those enticing cliffs...
But THAT is another story!
Where are you that there are scorpions? Ewwwwwwwwwwwww. Double Ewwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww.
ReplyDeleteI'm guessing they're in southern France somewhere, which starts getting very much like Spain... Beautiful, despite the scorpions, of course.
ReplyDeleteWhat a lovely bunch of photos and a lovely place you were staying it. Is it a friends? And the pool, looked great. But, my favorite shot in this bunch is the one of M&H having a little dejeuner on the porch.
We were in a village called Manas in the south of France - an hour south of Lyons -in a region called the Drôme. A midwife friend of Mom's lent us her house while she was on vacation near Bordeaux. There are also horned vipers and bats - but not vampire bats - in southern France, but we didn't meet any! If the Gettysburg Family and/or Monique and John ever want to come, we will happily be your guides to this wild region. We'll need lots of tents to house everybody though but it would be fun!
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