More on village life

Another first last Saturday - my first wedding in France! A young girl who used to worked with JL on research projects and also studied at the same engineering school and also a Parisian got married to a champagne guy from Verzenay.  We were fortunate to be invited to the church and what they call, the wine in honour.  In France you can invite friends, colleagues, all the people you would like to invite but is not close enough to be invited to the reception, to the church and the wine in honour afterwards, which comprise champagne and some small snacks, in our case, brioche, salty bread and the famous rose biscuit from Reims.  Knowing there's not much parking at the church, we've decided to walk from our house, as it is not far. Punishment to me who is not use to wearing high heels anymore! 
The process is a bit different from our weddings.  A group of the family walks in at the beginning and afterwards the bride with her dad.  I don't think the Parisians who attended the wedding realised the parking problem we have in our village and a number of people were quite late for the wedding.  And the seats in the church were by far not enough, so a group ended up standing in the back.
The church is in the main street. At the end of the service we went outside, no little girls with confetti or rose leaves to throw.  Even though the main street comprises two lanes, some people parked in the street and the rest of the main street were blocked by all the guests who gathered outside of the church.  Eventually a big car decided he is no longer waiting for this, and started steering his way through the people pressing them against the parked cars, followed by other cars which have piled up behind.  I was fearing someone's toes will be squashed int he process, but by the time we left, all was fine.  I was shaking my head, this is village life in France.  You have a wedding and the main street is impossible for traffic!

the bride's car in the champagne valley (this is what you'll see in the vineyards while they are working):

We left to Mailly where the wine of honour was served.  The bottles were from the bridegroom's house with the labels having their names and date on it.  It was held at the same co-op where I have parked in May during the gastronomy fête and in the corner of the big open hall (under roof) were a little orchestra playing jazz music while guests were queuing to congratulate the couple and waiters were walking up and down to refill the champagne glasses.

The next day we had the first proper summer day and decided we have to profit of the good weather.  Fortunately JL grilled a chicken in the oven the previous evening, so the leftovers were perfect for a picnic, together with half a bottle of SA red wine we still had.  We've packed the picnic bag and off we went for a walk in the forest, following small tracks not used by many people. In fact, we've met no other people. After all the rains we've had it was very muddy, but eventually we found a small open sunny spot in the forest where we could enjoy our picnic.

The barley was ready to be harvested and with the good weather arriving at last, the farmers moved quickly during the week to get their crop off the land.  You could hear the harvesting machines during the day and even in the evenings, even though we are surrounded by the vineyards and the crops are all in the valley below.  And you dust the house today to find everything covered in a layer of dusty sand by tomorrow!

As in SA, works take place during the big holidays, which have commenced recently.  First our main road to Mailly was closed for works, now it is the road to Verzy.  With all the rain that we've had there are much more work in the vineyards (spraying against pests and cutting the branches to keep them tidy) - which results in more traffic on the small village roads (in addition to numerous tourists getting lost in small village roads).  The combination with the works in the road results in traffic jams that I can at times hardly enter our house!  The streets are so narrow, that you have to wait for others to pass before you can move and by then you cannot enter, as there are other cars who want to pass - a nightmare, fortunately my reverse parking is not bad (as that is the best way to access our driveway!).

Finding a place for holiday on short notice is another story.  One realises there are just so much more people than in SA when you try to find a place and it fills up while you are investigating whether it is a good place or not.  Finally I decided to throw in the towel, we can stay at home for all that I care.  Fortunately with JL insisting that we look for a place not far from Fouras, we've managed to find a place in Ile d'Oleron, a great place to cycle and for him to enjoy oysters! I hope we'll have good weather though...

This morning we went exploring the Côte de Blanc (the region that mainly grows chardonnay to make champagne, on the other side of the Montagne) with Nina and Damien who arrived last night from Paris to visit us for the weekend.  And once again I had to admit, we live in a beautiful region and there are still so many places around us to explore!