Burgundy is château country and we are fortunate to have two within easy walking distance of our canal. Yesterday, we visited Le Château d’Ancy-le-Franc, in the little village of Ancy-le-Franc is an amazing Renaissance ‘palace’, built by the Italian architect Serlio who was the architect of Francois I. It was built for Count Antione III [...]
It has been warm, hot really, with sunny, blue skies; absolutely marvellous. Makes you feel good when you wake to peaceful, warm mornings. The scenery is magnificent on this Canal de Bourgogne and we are enjoying every minute. It is said to be one of the most beautiful canal trips in France and it is [...]
Migennes and our dinner of cabillaud. Migennes, in Burgundy, is a short two hour drive south from Paris Charles de Gaulle airport. We arrived at CDG on an early flight out of Hong Kong, with Michael feeling very poorly, collected the Europcar and off we went GPS directing us to Auxerre where we need to [...]
I loved everything about this book! ‘A food lover’s pilgrimage to France: from the vineyards of Burgundy to the mountains of the Basque country food, wine, walking and history on the French pilgrim paths to Santiago de Compostella’ - it is one of the best books I have ever read. Remember, in my former life, [...]
Despite our great lunch at the Cristal room, we treated ourselves with another dinner out, as we could eat my lapin with calvados, apple cider and apples any night on the barge! La Coupole is one of the great Parisian brasseries of la belle époque’ and is the favourite of Celebrity English Chef, Rick Stein, [...]
John’s birthday lunch at the Cristal Room, Baccarat Museum. Michael has talked about taking me the Baccarat Cristal Room restaurant for a long time; usually our visits to Paris are too short. Now, we have time as we are staying for 3 nights in The Arsenal, the barge mooring, right in the centre of Paris, [...]
Armchair travel back to Saint-Rémy-de-Provence – the birthplace of Nostradamus! My friend and colleague in Saint-Rémy-de-Provence, Karen Stride, established her Gourmet Escapades in Saint-Rémy, last year, and is living ‘My French life’ as described by Vicki Archer in her book of that name! January is my reading time and I treasure every moment. [...]
La Madeleine, with 2 star Michelin chef, Patrick Gauthier, was the special highlight dinner during my 2007 stay at La Varenne residential cooking school in Burgundy. Coming back to Sens this time on the barge was a wonderful opportunity for us to book La Madeleine and for me to meet up with Chef [...]
After my wonderful few days in Paris, I eventually met up with Michael who arrived from Australia late last Friday night. Instead of going into Paris for the night, we chose to stay at an airport hotel, ready for our early departure Saturday morning. We drove for the 3 hours to Bar-le-Duc, where our friend [...]
One of the special buildings in Marrakesh is the El Bahia Palace; it was built for Ahmed Ibn Moussa between 1894 and 1900 in the Alawi style that was popular at the time. Craftsmen were brought from Fez to work on this monumental task which took approximately fifteen years to complete. It is said that [...]
