Recap...FRANCE!

We had an epic journey to France to pick up Katreina! It was my first time back in the country since I was in high school (and that's been a hot minute!), and Frank and Trent's first trip to France. We were also joined by Grandma Sue who was on her second trip there. 

The main purpose of the trip was to get Katreina and meet her family so we spent a few days in Tours to do just that! I really like the town and can see why K was so happy there with her amazing host family. We visited her school and favorite stores, began our diet of fresh croissants, and walked miles along the streets with their charming mix of old and new buildings. While we were in town, we explored a few nearby sites of the Loire Valley--Chateau Villandry and Chateau du Clos Luce--but most of all just enjoyed staring at the face we haven't seen in person for 10 months.

So happy to see our French student!

Tours was a beautiful city!

Chateaux Villandry and its beautiful gardens.

Chateaux du Clos Lucé, final home of Leonardo da Vinci.

The five of us piled into our rental car, left the Loire Valley, and headed south toward the Dordogne River Valley. Along the way we stopped at the Village des Martyrs in Oradour-Sur-Glane to witness the horrors the Nazis inflicted on this country village on June 10, 1944. We spent a few days in the Dordogne exploring prehistoric art in the Cro-Magnon caves and enjoying the old town of Sarlat-la-Canéda. We visited Lascaux IV, Grotte de Rouffignac, and Grotte de Font-de-Guame, which was a real treat as only 78 respiring humans are allowed in each day and we somehow secured same-day entry. This region has much more for us to explore in the future!

"Remember" Oradour-Sur-Glane

Cro-Magnon Caves!

Sarlat-le-Canéda was such a great little town!

We spent a few days on the Brittany (Bretagne)/Normandy border in the cutest little carriage house as our base for a journey to the Mont-Saint-Michel Abbey, great dining on the Bretagne coast in Cherrueix, and a visit to the fortress port city of Saint-Malo. It was so cool watching the fisherman drive tractors out onto the sand at low tide to harvest mussels, clams, and oysters along this coast and the seafood was delicious!

Mont-Saint-Michel was unreal!

The Bretagne Coast and out cute neighbors at our AirBnB!

And we finished our trip in Normandy. As Trent is really into WWII history we stayed in Bayeux for a few days so that we could take our time and visit the historic locations. We visited the village of Ste-Mere Elise, Utah Beach, Pointe Du Hoc, the WWII Normandy American Cemetery, Longues-Sur-Mer Gun Battery, Omaha Beach, Port Winston artificial harbour, and the Battle Normandy Museum to learn about Allied and German planning and execution of D-Day and the war that continued afterward. Driving across Normandy really gave me a better appreciation of the geography (and the spread of our airborne forces). While the landing beaches are of great significance to the history of D-Day, on a hot weekend in June they were crowded with happy families enjoying the cool water--it was nice to see that such carnage could be replaced with joy. While in Bayeux we also checked out the Bayeux Tapestry which details William the Conqueror's rise from duke of Normandy to kind of England (and does so with some pretty graphic needlework in some spots!) over 70 yards of stitched scenes that were completed so the illiterate masses would know the story.

Ste-Mere-Elise, Utah Beach, and Pointe Du Hoc

Port Winston, Longues-Sur-Mer Gun Battery, the WWII Normandy American Cemetery, and Omaha Beach. These days were so moving and educational!

Bayeux was a beautiful village and we were able to eat a really good meal out!

We wound down our trip in the port city of Honfleur for no better reason than it looked like a cool, walkable port town with lots of good restaurants. Our group split up some for the day, but came together for one last wonderful dinner.

LOVED this little port village! As a sailor, it was great to be back near the water.

Driving in France wasn't so bad, even with our midsize car. They drive on the right, they love roundabouts (and as a former New Englander I was cool with that), and people actually only drive in the left lane to pass! Brilliant! Highways were easy, but narrow roads in some small towns were a little exciting! Parking in the cities and old town areas was tight, but we managed. The only real challenge was the stupid "AdBlue" emissions additive that we apparently were low on from the minute we got the rental. After some fabulous translation by K and the purchase of 10L of AdBlue and two funnels, we were good-to-go and wouldn't have the car shut down on us for the rest of the trip! (It's an EU diesel thing--you've been warned.)

We had one unplanned adventure on the trip--COVID. It got us all early on and while it definitely impacted the amount of time I spent at cafe tables sipping French wine, I am thankful that we all had only a day or two of minor symptoms and had nice, roomy AirBnBs to quarantine in. We were able to limit our contact with others, lay low, and make decent meals (and the grocery had great 3 euro wine!). Since most of our plans had us outdoors anyway, we only had to cancel a winery tour and tasting and we had plenty of flexibility in our trip to adjust. 

Yep, it got us. But at least our symptoms were mild and our quarantine spot was lovely!

~Jo, 1st Mate (or is it Lead Travel Agent???)

When "Thank You" isn't enough...

We've been a bit quiet lately as our focus has been on reconnecting with our daughter after her foreign exchange year in France! We actually traveled as a family (including grandma!) to pick her up, meet her French family, and do a little travel around France before returning.

About that family...they are amazing! We truly hit the jackpot with this host family and Katreina was definitely torn between being excited to go home and being sad because she had to leave them. Those are emotions that I'm glad she had! She is so fortunate to have been hosted by a family that she created a true bond with and I know she is missing them right now. 

As a military family, we have grown our geographically-spread "village" over the years and there are a few families that we've all become very close with (both kids and parents), so close that if our kids accidentally called those adults "mom" or "dad" we wouldn't be offended at all! And now Adeline and Alex have solidly joined that group. They kept Katreina safe and loved and having fun for 10 months, and she gained a few new siblings as part of the experience, too. And we are so happy to have them all as part of our crew!

Family <3
Merci beaucoup!

Merci beaucoup pour tout ce que vous avez fait pour notre fille!

~Jo, 1st Mate

Life in France

**We are SUPER excited to welcome our daughter, Katreina, to the writing staff of the family blog!!!**

Happy Holidays, everyone! As we are coming up on the New Year, I’ve started to reflect back on my time in France. If you don’t know by now, I’m currently taking an exchange year in France for my 10th grade year of high school. I’ve been here for about four months now, and every moment is one that I will cherish forever.

Orientation in Paris included the Eiffel Tower, the Louvre, and a cruise on the River Seine!

WHERE DID I GET THE IDEA?

I came up with this idea around the age of 10, when my love for Harry Potter made me dream about living my life in England. As I got older, I told my parents about my desire to spend an exchange year in England, to which they blatantly said no. They explained to me that while it was amazing to have a desire to travel, they wouldn’t send me to another country for an entire year where I already knew the language (which, I mean, fair enough). So, with my want to do an exchange year still high, I started thinking of different countries I could go to. I almost immediately thought of France, as I had spent my 7th grade year learning French in school, and it was up there on the list of countries I wanted to got to. This was just at the beginning of COVID, and with lockdowns and basically sitting around doing nothing, I said “why not?” and started to intensely learn French. 

Flash forward almost two years later, I’m speaking a new language in a new world, surrounded by some of the nicest people I’ve ever met. I live with an entirely different family, and I’m living an entirely different life. To some (or maybe to many), that would scare them to death—and there have been times where all I’ve wanted to do is go back to the U.S.—but I’m loving this journey. I’m learning to be independent, to make my own decisions and to find myself, all while learning a new language. It really is something you’re able to experience only once in a lifetime and everyday I’m grateful that things have worked out well for me.

TRANSPORTATION

I live in Tours, France. It’s a relatively big town, and I live close to its city center. There is a lot of public transportation, so I can go almost anywhere I’d like. It’s a very big change from my remote life on a boat, but I love being able to be very independent when I need to go somewhere. I don’t have to ask for a ride places, I can just look at the bus schedule and leave when I need. 

L' Hôtel de Ville of Tours 

The tram...to school and around town.

SCHOOL

My school schedule is amazing. Most days, I finish by 3 o’clock in the afternoon, which gives me most of the afternoon to do what I want. I have 10 classes (each with varying hours throughout the week): English, French, History & Geography, Math, Physics & Chemistry, Earth & Life Sciences, Technology Sciences, Social & Economical Sciences, Civics, and P.E. I would have 11, but early into the school year, I was removed from Spanish since I had never previously studied it. I have more than an hour and a half to eat lunch everyday (and Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, I go back to my house to eat), so I never feel rushed like I did in the U.S. My grades are on average, and as time moves on here, I’m slowly getting better and better grades. School is definitely more professional than in the U.S. We refer to the teachers with vous (you but when referring to more than one person, someone you don’t know, or someone who is superior to you- in this case, we use vous because teachers are superior to students) and every time a teacher enters the classroom, we stand up and wait to be seated by the teacher. In the U.S., teachers are much more friendly, but here teachers are never ‘friends’ with the students.  It’s definitely different, but it’s nice to experience this type of change. One big difference that even French kids don’t like about high school is the fact that there aren’t school sports, prom, or anything like that. Most of these things are solely in the U.S., so many kids here want to go to the States for one year just to experience it. All in all, though, I really like high school here, even if the classes are a little more challenging.

FREE TIME

After school, and during my free time, I’ve become much more social. I usually like to walk around town with friends or my host sister (who is the same age as me). Sometimes we’ll have a small coffee in town, grab a bite to eat, or browse clothing stores. I also really enjoy going to the movies and just in general talking to the people I know. Their lives contrast greatly to the normal that I know and it’s nice to hear about their experiences. I love hearing and talking about the differences between the States and France because I can learn all the things that I’m missing- and gaining- while I’m living here. 

Croqué Monsieur with friends...dining out around town is a favorite activity.

HOST FAMILY

Most of all, I am very lucky to have a kind and loving host family. In my host family, I have a mom and dad and two sisters—one my age, and one who is six years old. I know several other exchange students who haven’t had as much luck as I have and to have a really great connection with my host family is great. They have been truly nice to me (even buying me Christmas gifts when I couldn’t go back to the Bahamas to spend Christmas with my family) and they make sure that I don’t miss out on any French experiences. They help me with my French when I can’t pronounce a certain word (for the moment it’s the special r sound in horrible), and now I help them with their English. I am truly content to be placed with this family; I would never think about changing families.

Ma famille. Love learning about France with my sisters, Margaux and Romy!

IS IT WORTH IT?

While this is only a sliver of what my life is like in France, I can promise that every second is amazing. There have definitely been tears and homesickness (especially during the holidays) but every day I’m learning how to cope and appreciate living in the moment. I don’t want to go back to the U.S. just yet…I still have so much to experience and so much to learn. And while my French has definitely improved, I don’t think I’m quite ready to call myself bilingual. All of this is a learning experience, so if you ever have the opportunity to do something like it, I would 100% say GO FOR IT!!

~Katreina, 2nd Mate and young nomad extraordinaire