Paris and Pornic

As every year, in October, my colleagues Elisa and Franck and I travel to Paris to visit some of our biggest French clients. Already the last two years I tried to combine this trip to France with the visit of a very old French friend of mine, Fabienne, who I hadn't seen in ages. Unfortunately, the last couple of times we never mangaged to meet. However, in 2012 we would make it work out!!! :-)

So, on Wednesday 17/10 in the afternoon my colleague Elisa and I flew to Paris. Franck only joined us on Thursday morning right before the first meeting with one of our clients. We also went out for lunch with them. Another appointment was set for the afternoon and in the evening the three of us went out for some typical French dinner.

The next morning, Friday 19/10, was quite relaxed as one client had cancelled the meeting kind of last minute. Nevertheless, the "free" morning was used to work, at least until we headed towards lunch with yet another client. Later on we had a meeting with their whole staff, but I had to leave from that earlier. We thought we'd be done by 3 p.m. and with the permission of Franck I had booked train tickets for 4 p.m. to get myself to the west coast of France to meet Fabienne. So, despite the client meeting not being over, I said goodbye to our client at around 3 p.m. and rushed with a taxi to the Montparnasse train station.
From there I had a train at 15:52 via Nantes further on to St. Nazaire, the city where Fabienne works. I really enjoyed the train ride: I was in France, surrounded by French people and French language, on my way for a non-business weekend in a country I really like a lot :-) I felt good!
My train arrived at 19:30 in St. Nazaire and Fabienne picked me up right after work. We then drove to Pornic where she and her husband had moved about a year ago.
Arrived in Pornic I met her recently married husband François and also her dog Tica for the first time - and it was a pleasure :-)
I was welcomed with homemade zucchini quiche and wine, very French and very delicious! It was a nice and communicative evening. Of course, because Fabienne and I hadn't seen each other for ages and thus we had a lot to catch up with.

The next day we went to the local market to buy some fish, meat and fruits. Later on, for lunch, we went to have crêpes in a crêperie right in the city centre, by the harbour of Pornic.

In the background: le Chateau de Pornic (Pornic Castle).

  

Crêpes and Cidre - it feels so good to be in France!!!

Have a look at the difference of the water level on the below pictures and the pictures above taken an hour earlier. It's the sea that regularly makes its way into the town, filling its harbour to a high level before withdrawing itself again and leaving the many boats back on dry land.

In the afternoon we went back home to pack some stuff as we were invited to a friend's 30th birthday surprise party.

Fabienne showing me the two hens they got just a week before.

Since this party was two hours away from Pornic, further South towards La Rochelle, it was planned to stay there overnight - including the dog, hence a lot to pack.

It was about a two hours drive to Fabienne's and François' friend's place. He grew up and lived together with his family on a farm. One of the animals living on that farm was this huuuge dog Gaspard welcoming us.

Together with the other guests we helped the hosts with the decoration and the dinner preparation for the party. On the menu: raclette :-)

Surprise!!!

 

French and yummy: raclette :-)

My friend Fabienne on the right...

...her husband François on the left.

  

Dessert: l'Île Flottante - also very French and yummy :-)

 

All of the guests were actually staying over at the farm house. The hosts had cleaned the loft so that all guests had space up there to put their inflatable mattrasses, thermomats and sleeping bags. It was really funny as we were about 15 people (all unknown to me) all sleeping next to each other, like sardines. However, it was a nice amotsphere, easy going and not so conservative.

The night was of course not very long. We had been to bed late and at one point the various guest dogs (including Tica) got annoyed by all their masters still sleeping and thus came all up to wake us up!

After a very informal breakfast Fabienne and I went for a little tour on the farm. The host family and the "birthday" person were already up since early in the morning doing the farm work, i.e. feeding the cows etc.

One of the new born calves.

 

  
After lunch we all said goodbye - also the dogs. They were just too funny those three totally different sized dogs. The small one, due to its size, constantly tried to catch the attention of the 5 times bigger Gaspard who just couldn't be bothered by this little "thing". However the little one was so persistent in getting attention that Gaspard got annoyed and angry, so that Tica, the socially inclined labrador, tried to calm them both down. The situation was just too funny to observe!

Anyway, it was time to leave.

It was in the late afternoon on Sunday 21/10 that we arrived back in Pornic. We only unpacked and then went for a walk along the beach with Tica who had so much fun playing on the beach and in the water!

 

 

 

It must have been for about an hour that we had been out on the beach. The sea air was good, but made us even more tired. So the evening was not too long anymore for us. We had cooked some dinner, exchanged and looked at the pictures from the weekend and went to bed. The next morning both, Fabienne and François had to get up early for work.

Same for me: I got up with them as I left the house together with Fabienne. On her way to work she dropped me off in the centre of Pornic where I still had some hours on my own before catching my train back to Paris. A very nice man at the train station allowed me to store my luggage at his office. This allowed me to spend a very nice morning in this little quiet place, which in summer turns into a very popular and much more lively tourist place. I so much enjoyed walking along the sea side, through the calm residential areas and back to the harbour imagining the life there in the busy summer.

I collected a lot of nice impressions during my discovery walk through Pornic which I ended at probably the most popular place in town: la Fraiseraie - let's call it the "Strawberry heaven" :-)

 

They have such great, natural products, initially only based on everything with strawberries. I was told they have the best strawberry ice-cream. So I couldn't get around buying myself an ice-cream at already 10 a.m. in the morning after just having had breakfast - and I do confirm: they have the best ever strawberry ice-cream!

On my way back to the train station I jumped into a local bakery store to get some of those delicious French pastries, including a very special cake from that aera: the Kouign Amann, a typical Breton cake full of butter - but veeeeeeeeeeeery good!

Loaded with great French delicacies and nice memories of a special weekend and a beautiful walk through Pornic I took my train back to Paris and from there my flight back to Oslo.

Merci beaucoup, Fabienne et Fraçois pour m'avoir accueillie chez vous :-) C'était un grand plaisir de t'avoir revue, Fabienne, et d'avoir fait ta connaissance, François.

Thanks for having welcomed me so warmly! I had a great time!

It's always nice to be in France!