Finally Made It To France!

After what seems like the longest two and a half weeks ever, we’ve made it to France – the focal point of this trip for me.  Although I was sad to leave Barcelona – it really has been the most enjoyable place we’ve visited thus far – I am excited and happy to finally be here!

We booked to stay at a bed and breakfast with a family in Montpellier (http://www.dauzac.org) and when we arrived we were pleasantly surprised to find the nicest and largest room we’ve had so far (although still no private bathroom).  The family has twelve kids and five of them have grown up and left home, so they house a few students who come to Montpellier for school, and a few vacationers like us.  It’s a little bit different for us to be in a house full of kids – there is a constant buzz of activity when they get home from school and it seems like everyone goes to sleep by ten o’clock – but it’s a nice atmosphere and they do their best to communicate with us even though the father (Jean-Luc) is the only one who speaks English.

Jean-Luc and Anne, his wife, offered a half-board option (7 euros each to have dinner with the family) when we made the booking, and, when booked the train ride here and realized how long it would take to get here from Barcelona, we decided half-board would be the best way to go for our first night.  For dinner tonight they served a wonderful tomato salad, a pasta dish with some kind of traditional French sauce from this region that is made with mixed vegetables, and a baked potato dish that is from another region that one of their students is from.  Jean-Luc is “in charge” of the bread (there is a basket full of loaves of baguettes in front of him) and he happily slices and tosses bread to each child that is sitting around the big dining table.  I sat to his right and throughout dinner he kept replenishing my supply of bread (he told me it is French tradition to always have a piece of bread available beside your plate).  I think I might have eaten more bread tonight than I have in all of 2009 so far!

When everyone had finished their meal, a HUGE platter of cheese was brought out – Jean-Luc told us that in France you have cheese before dessert – followed by a tray of assorted mini yogurts for dessert.  Although I’m not a big fan of cheese, I gave it a try (when in France, do as the French do!) and found one type I liked (don’t remember the name), one that was ok, and a type of Roquefort cheese specific to this region that cannot be exported because of the amount of moisture in it that was way too strong a flavor for me!

Because the house is kind of far from city center (about a 25 minute walk) and the dinner tonight was pretty good, we’ve decided we will do half-board for the entire duration of our stay.  The only thing we hope is that they are not vegetarian (there was no meat tonight), but even if they are, we could probably live with it. 

So far, France feels better than Portugal and Spain – the food is good and the people are nice (which we were told wouldn’t be the case because we don’t speak fluent French).  I look forward to exploring the city tomorrow J