shenaniganza in poitou-charentes

I had a wonderful week with Emily visiting Jessica in Niort. Jessica really went out of her way to make it such an awesome week for us. We definitely tortured her poor fiance with our rapid fire nonstop conversations, but I think he found us amusing at times, and he started being less shy around us after a few days.

We arrived on Thursday evening after a not so fun journey of sitting in the hallway of two adjoining cars on the TGV because of the strike before changing to a packed TER train. Oh what fun! But we made it, and Jess had a delicious dinner, pineau, and crumble waiting for us!

Friday, we explored Niort a bit where our free town navette was rerouted because of a tractor strike. Yes, the friendly bus driver actually referred to it as just that, "une greve des tracteurs". In the afternoon, we headed over to Poitiers where we met up with Eileen. She gave us a tour of the town, and we went to the apero geant (a huge apero... aka an excuse to drink in the town square) which in true French fashion didn't really get going until hours after it was supposed to.

Saturday, we went to the market in Niort. Definitely a better market than that of Chauny! I enjoyed it. The afternoon, the four of us went to La Rochelle where we had a lovely afternoon exploring the town, eating ice cream at the port, having a drink next to the water, and just enjoying ourselves.

Greg was kind enough to take a picture of the three of us girls together.

 

Sunday, we took a drive to the Venise Verte and wandered along the river some. It was such a nice lazy day, and we fully enjoyed it.

Monday, we stayed in Niort and had some amazing hot chocolate. We also watched some horribly addicting British soap operas on the BBC channel she gets. It amused us.

Tuesday, we took a roadtrip to Nantes where we had lunch at Ikea (my first introduction to the store) before heading into town and visiting the chateau, the tiny winding streets, and the shops.

All in all, a wonderful week. Quite possibly one of my best vacations yet. It was a week filled with good conversation, delicious food, good drinks, and many other things. Jess also did her Australian duty and introduced us to Tim-Tams and Tim Tam Slams. I cannot thank her and Greg enough for being so generous to us! We will have to be treating them to something when they come to Paris this weekend.

On the way back to Chauny on Wednesday, I was able to meet up briefly with Anna and her father which was nice. Sadly, I don't think I'll be seeing her again until at least August.

Tomorrow, I am off to Paris for the weekend. I'm really looking forward to it! We have some big plans, and I'm going to be meeting up with lots of people including Paul from last year! I cannot wait!