A few weeks ago I went to France with a dozen friends, for a holiday which had been postponed a couple of times since June 2020. I began, along with ![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
atreic and emperor, with a long leisurely train journey to Chenonceaux, where we spent a couple of nights, before continuing to Brive-la-Gailliarde to pick up a hire car and drive (or in my case, be driven) the rest of the way to the Chateau de Lamostonie, where the rest of the group gathered. It was our fourth stay there, and it felt like a kind of homecoming.
All told it was a wonderful holiday for me at least, although not entirely lacking in stressors. The most acute of which was one member of the party testing positive for covid on the first day, and having to manage transmission risk between her and her wife, and her wife and the rest of us. Other highlights were a minor prang to the hire car, and some ongoing problems with the chateau's electricity, although other people did most of the hard work of managing those issues.
One area where I did manage to be helpful was having got my French to a level where I could communicate a bit more usefully than in previous years. I started the week quite disheartened when my attempt to buy three Parisian Oystercard equivalents foundered over my inability to convey that I understood that you could put more than one ticket on a single card, but I wanted tickets for multiple people. It definitely got better from there however, and I managed things like saying that I really did want to buy one of every kind of pasty in the patisserie, but that I wasn't actually going to eat them all myself, and explaining which bits of the car were already damaged when we hired it and which were new. I was particularly pleased when we went to Mass in Rocamadour that I was able to follow the sermon to a reasonable level of detail. I'm sure there were nuances which I missed, but I got a lot more than I would have anticipated.
Whilst we had to rejig some of our plans to work around covid stuff, we still managed an awful lot of fun things - there was a hike which started in Cahors, and followed the Camino for a while, a couple of readthroughs, a highlights reel from the planned singthrough of Threepenny Opera (dubbed Threepenny bits), a superb meal cooked by a local chef, visits to the nearby villages of Rocamadour (implausibly located half way up a cliff, and a rival to Walsingham for catholic tat) and Marcilhac (home to a ruined abbey which has been half restored and is still in occasional use as a church, as well as some splendid views of the valley), some choral singing, a vineyard tour and wine tasting, and a ceilidh interspersed with musical performances. And in amongst all that activity, there was also a goodly amount of sitting by or splashing around in the pool, relaxing in the company of many of my very favourite people.
Perhaps one of my very favourite memories of the week was the detour we took on the way back from Rocamadour to visit a swimming hole thatatreic had discovered. They and I swam, whilst leonato paddled gingerly, and emperor observed safely from the shaded bank. The pool was very very deep, and fed by water from underground caves, which meant that it was really rather cold, but impossibly blue and clear. Encircled by lilies, with bullfrogs singing loudly and bright blue dragonflies darting overhead, it really did feel as though we'd slipped into a fairy realm for a while.
Another thing that really stood out to me about the trip as a whole is the grace and generosity and kindness that everyone showed as we negotiated how to manage covid risk together. Despite some quite different risk appetites and levels of disappointment at being unable to do various things, and the whole situation being quite a stressful one, there was a remarkable willingness to compromise and an absence of conflict which really brought home to me, once again, how lucky I am to have such bloody marvellous friends.
atreic and emperor, with a long leisurely train journey to Chenonceaux, where we spent a couple of nights, before continuing to Brive-la-Gailliarde to pick up a hire car and drive (or in my case, be driven) the rest of the way to the Chateau de Lamostonie, where the rest of the group gathered. It was our fourth stay there, and it felt like a kind of homecoming.All told it was a wonderful holiday for me at least, although not entirely lacking in stressors. The most acute of which was one member of the party testing positive for covid on the first day, and having to manage transmission risk between her and her wife, and her wife and the rest of us. Other highlights were a minor prang to the hire car, and some ongoing problems with the chateau's electricity, although other people did most of the hard work of managing those issues.
One area where I did manage to be helpful was having got my French to a level where I could communicate a bit more usefully than in previous years. I started the week quite disheartened when my attempt to buy three Parisian Oystercard equivalents foundered over my inability to convey that I understood that you could put more than one ticket on a single card, but I wanted tickets for multiple people. It definitely got better from there however, and I managed things like saying that I really did want to buy one of every kind of pasty in the patisserie, but that I wasn't actually going to eat them all myself, and explaining which bits of the car were already damaged when we hired it and which were new. I was particularly pleased when we went to Mass in Rocamadour that I was able to follow the sermon to a reasonable level of detail. I'm sure there were nuances which I missed, but I got a lot more than I would have anticipated.
Whilst we had to rejig some of our plans to work around covid stuff, we still managed an awful lot of fun things - there was a hike which started in Cahors, and followed the Camino for a while, a couple of readthroughs, a highlights reel from the planned singthrough of Threepenny Opera (dubbed Threepenny bits), a superb meal cooked by a local chef, visits to the nearby villages of Rocamadour (implausibly located half way up a cliff, and a rival to Walsingham for catholic tat) and Marcilhac (home to a ruined abbey which has been half restored and is still in occasional use as a church, as well as some splendid views of the valley), some choral singing, a vineyard tour and wine tasting, and a ceilidh interspersed with musical performances. And in amongst all that activity, there was also a goodly amount of sitting by or splashing around in the pool, relaxing in the company of many of my very favourite people.
Perhaps one of my very favourite memories of the week was the detour we took on the way back from Rocamadour to visit a swimming hole that
atreic had discovered. They and I swam, whilst leonato paddled gingerly, and emperor observed safely from the shaded bank. The pool was very very deep, and fed by water from underground caves, which meant that it was really rather cold, but impossibly blue and clear. Encircled by lilies, with bullfrogs singing loudly and bright blue dragonflies darting overhead, it really did feel as though we'd slipped into a fairy realm for a while.Another thing that really stood out to me about the trip as a whole is the grace and generosity and kindness that everyone showed as we negotiated how to manage covid risk together. Despite some quite different risk appetites and levels of disappointment at being unable to do various things, and the whole situation being quite a stressful one, there was a remarkable willingness to compromise and an absence of conflict which really brought home to me, once again, how lucky I am to have such bloody marvellous friends.
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Date: 2022-07-17 06:41 pm (UTC)From:no subject
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Date: 2022-07-17 08:30 pm (UTC)From:Yay! for mostly happy holiday
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