Feb 2 Schools Out!

'We had a lot of fun at school again and met a bunch of nice people again. I think you kind of get to know people when you spend 4 hours a day talking to them. The fact that it is all in french doesn't seem to hurt. We went out to dinner with our new friends a couple of times and laughed ourselves sore both times. 

I ordered three new tires for our bikes from the local bike shop Culture Velo and they came in last friday, so we have almost a full set of new tires. Schwalbe Marathon Plus with extra puncture protection is the way to go on a touring bike where weight is not an issue. They say that they handle corners well too and that the sidewalls last for ever. That is the trouble with the Continentals we have now, the side walls look too scary to ride on.

Street food french style!

A church by the museum Granet

Front of the St Jean de Malte church next to the Granet Museum

Corner saints watch over many of the streets in Aix, it is actually more efective than survailence cameras.

There are lots of lawyers in Aix

This town has lots of pretty features. This is an old wall near Thermes Sextius, it is not as sexy as it sounds.

We went for dinner at our friends apartment. One of our friends got the lucky toy inside her piece of cake.

When you get the toy in your piece of cake you get to be king or queen of the party. Sarah was a good and just queen.

Jerry got the bean so tradition states that Jerry buys the next cake. One should never argue with tradition Jerry! Yoly and I look forward to the next cake!

I love this shoe store. Too bad I don't need shoes.

Or socks.

La Belle Epoque Brasserie on the Cours Mirabeau

Les Deux Garçons restaurant from back in Paul Cezanne and Picasso's days where they used to hang out.

Le cours Mirabeau at night in the rain.

Cuban style salsa lessons! Guess who was the star student!

You guessed it, he couldn't help it.

There is a bit of snow around Aix neighbouring villages we can tell from the commuters.

We had dinner too, it wasn't all just drinking!

 

Russia, Switzerland, USA, Canada, Austrailia, England and Guatemala all represented at the table. We had to speak french, the languge of diplomacy, to accomadate everyone.

We have a nice garden at our current appartment.

The lemon and the orange tree!

This guy was making the Ipad movie of the wedding procession but the driver missed the corner, so it is going to be a lame movie.

A living wall behind the fountain.

More low tech crime prevention tools.

We included this picture for our pilot friends, they are clouds, pilots love clouds!

This is a war memorial I might have to go back to try and figure our what the front half of a lioness drooling on her own paw means. There is a sign that explains it but I am not sure I fully understood it. I reread the sign and the lioness represents the protection of the memory. There is another picture coming that shows the fallen soldier inside her chest near her heart, the memory being protected. The water feature is there so it can be classified as a fountain. Pretty soon it will look like this.

A fountain on the Cours Mirabeau.

This is the memory protected inside the lioness.