While the (top) cat’s away... (May 6 to 9th)

Following our first weekend in Uzes, including the Medieval Day, the next week was notable for the fact that Elle was heading back to Paris to rendezvous with her sister Kate, coming to visit us in France from Cambodia.  This meant Andrew was in charge of the GWX troika for 3 days, surpassing the previous record of ~36 hours.

Firstly, we had to drop Elle at the Avignon TGV, for her to catch the fast train to Paris.  With her departure time being in the afternoon we decided to go to Avignon early and take a look around.  Tummies were rumbling not long after we found a car park and wandered into the Centre Ville, so we found a creperie in Rue de la Republic.

We then wandered past two of the primary tourist attractions in Avignon, the Palais des Papes and the Pont d’Avignon .....

..... before deciding to have a walk along the Rhone River.  This is where another ‘family moment’ occurred (perhaps brought on by the additional stress of farewelling Mum, or just another case of a individuals not considering consequences and appropriate responses).  The photo below was taken by Elle, approximately 0.5 seconds before ‘flash point’.

As you can see, William decided to climb on Dad for fun.  This wasn’t a problem, but not responding to increasingly loud ‘requests’ to ‘please get off’, ‘get off’, and ‘GET OFF’, was.  The upshot was that Andrew fell backwards, rolled onto his backpack, over-reacted with a verbal assault on Will, who stormed off in a huff .  Another holiday family moment!  Fortunately, after time cooled heads, relations were restored, just in time to give Elle confidence to board the train.

The next day, we went to a local Fun Park, where Grace and William had a great time.  Xavier had mixed feelings.  He loved the Les Pirates and La Dune jumping castles he was allowed to go on,  but was very disappointed and confused as to why he wasn’t allowed to join in on all activities (most of which had a minimum age requirement of 4).

Grace and William’s favourite rides were the Trampoline Elastique and the Karting Electrique.  Aside from somersaults, the particular highlight with the Trampoline Elastique was Le Grande Rebond (ie very large final bounce created by the attendant using his weight to pull the kids down quickly and then letting go).  Both performed well on the battery powered karts in a match race won by William, after Grace crashed twice in the final laps.

On the next day, we drove an hour in a North-West direction to Anduze, for a ride on the Train á Vapeur.  The train journey to St Jean du Gard took about one hour, winding around (and tunnelling through) hills, with views over streams and small villages.

While disembarking at St Jean, Andrew noted a novel way to bring your dog with you on a day trip.

Before embarking on the return journey to Anduze, Andrew and the kids had a small look around the village, before finding another nice creperie for lunch (Lettres et mets).

Upon return to Uzes, we went to the large Carrefour store to purchase some items to welcome (back) Mum and Kate to Uzes the next day.  We decided we would include balloons as part of the welcome home message, but our efforts were hampered by a selection problem. In addition to standard and large balloons, we purchased animal balloons – cleverly marketed with pictures showing large trunks and elongated necks.  However, upon blowing very hard we realised they were never going to look like the pictures.  The red rabbit burst, the yellow elephant had a miniscule truck, and the blue duck ...... well at least he provided Andrew with a laugh, and a chance to explain the colloquial term to Grace and William.

Upon completion, we had our Bienvenue sign at the entrance to the apartment, with balloons.

So what was eaten at 2 Rue Pélisserie, Uzes while Elle, the primary (sole) cook was away?  Breakfast and lunch are easy to oversee in Uzes (Special K with chocolate feuilles, followed up with baguettes/pastries).  Dinner presented more of a challenge, as Andrew’s menu planning and cooking skills are moderate.  Alas the easy option was taken, and mostly pre-prepared meals were eaten over the 3 nights.  Fish (fingers) and chips on night 1, and Lasagna on night 3 went down well, but the highlight was the night 2 French classic quiche lorraine, appropriately supported by french fries!