Big Hikes

So one of the wonderful things to do in Chamonix, obviously, in the summertime is to hike some of the many, many, MANY gorgeous mountain trails in the valley. We have already tackled a few. One really fun one involved taking a cable car up to about 2000m (the Plan d'Aguille), hiking to a glacial lake for a swim (well, more of a very quick dunk) then staying overnight in a mountain hut. We then hiked across the ridge (about three hours) to where we could catch a little mountain train down. The hut was a lot of fun, and I think the highlight was the giant bowls of hot chocolate the girls were served in the morning for breakfast. The hike was not only jaw-droppingly scenic (see attached) but also offered up lots of wild blueberries for the girls to gather. The result was that they basically ran the trail in their desire to gather the most blueberries. At one point an elderly French lady (even the octogenarians hike around here) stopped to ask what we were doing, and when I responded something about gathering 'bluets' she immediately said, 'Ah, vous etes Canadiennes!'. I immediately wondered what gave it away (the accent, the baseball cap, the teeth??) and she explained that blueberries are called 'myrtilles' here. So something new learned already.

Local donkeys provided some entertainment on the trail.

 They insisted on hiking with us for awhile.

Not bad for a view.

 Even dolly came along for the hike.

More hiking.

 The glacial lake - pre-swim.

 The girls were incredibly hardy. (We definitely provided the entertainment for the many tourists who clearly thought we were mad...)

 Indra doing the dip.

 Anna striking a pose.

 Indra enjoying her bowl of hot chocolate.

 Montenvers hike.

 Toby and Anna.

'Some are sour, some are sweet. Mountain blueberries for us to eat'.

The Food Files

I guess this entry is mainly about food. We haven’t really struck out into unexplored territory in terms of food items so far – my shops have mainly been in very small grocery stores in town where I’ve just been keen to grab familiar brands and run, or at the mega mega superstore, where I’ve also just been keen to fill my basket with necessities before the girls completely lose interest. But the highlights so far have definitely been the cheese (impossible to buy a poor camembert, it seems); the wine (good wine for about four or five dollars! One day I might even splash out on the seven dollar wine and who KNOWS how good that will be, can’t wait); the crisps (Dijon flavoured crisps – my new fave – and forget boring old salt and vinegar, it’s vinaigre echalot here, thank you very much); the pre-dinner nibbles like feta-stuffed olives and little gouda-flavoured crackers; and then there’s the girls’ big discovery: fruit syrups to add to water. So far we’ve tried strawberry, raspberry, lemon, and blackcurrant, and I have my eye on grapefruit, and passionfruit. And that’s only the beginning! (I know it’s basically sugar, and that I will have to wean the girls off them and back to plain water soon, but it’s rather fun for the moment.)

We also spent Saturday morning at the local market. I don’t think it rivals big markets in other French towns but it’s certainly big enough, and has the requisite cheese stalls, charcuterie stalls, olive stalls, fruit & veg stalls and of course, the absolutely necessary nougat stall. (See picture of Anna in front of the huge wheels of nougat – I don’t think I will be able to hold out much longer.) I bought a huge punnet of varied olives and they were absolutely heavenly. And gone already.

 Zoe and Anna looking for whatever is 'bon marche'

 Toby graciously indulging my olive demands

 Now THAT'S what I call nougat...

 The girls on the walk we did post-marche. (The weather improved...)

 The dangers of too much market-ing...

Settling In

(The following few blog posts were all written a while ago, but just posted now, so don't be surprised if the dates are out of sync! It's taken a couple of weeks to get the internet sorted out here, so I'm a little behind. But I kept writing, even though I wasn't posting!)

OK, little bit of a jump from T-7 to T+5. Not quite the detailed record I was aiming to keep of our year…but hopefully I’ll improve. So, we’re here, day 5, and it’s just another gorgeous day in paradise. Which isn’t really so far from the truth, as we seem to have landed in the middle of a heatwave and every day so far has been hot and incredibly sunny (see pix). So one of the first priorities, in the midst of unpacking, food shopping, car buying, phone organizing, internet troubleshooting (still not solved, one excuse for the lack of blog and email time), town exploring, school registration, croissant eating etc. etc. has been to scope out the town swimming pool. All I can say is, ‘wow’. It’s an indoor/outdoor pool in a (surprise!) alpine meadow with mountains on all sides, four pools, a huge water slide, shower park for the little’uns and saunas, hammams etc. And once the girls finalize their registration at school, it will be completely free for the kids.

Chamonix is proving quite incredible with their encouragement of subsidized activities for kids. All school-age kids get a free pass to the swimming pool, practically free lift passes for skiing and hiking, and with their school will be doing downhill skiing (Anna), x-country skiing (Indie, Zoe) and skating (all). Plus on their Wednesdays off (yes, it’s only a four-day school week here) there are three services competing to offer the kids sporting activities.

So I think you can see what has been my priority so far: Toby has been concentrating on the car buying (we think we have found a good one), and support services, while I’ve been focused on the chalet, food and the girls.

The pictures probably speak to our experience best – the view from our chalet is unbelievable, and that is also the view from our bedroom (which basically has a wall of windows overlooking the Mont Blanc). The girls are very happy making themselves at home in the chalet, and walking into town for our daily baguette. I can also see that if I’m not careful the girls’ diet could easily consist of baguette and butter, butter and baguette and plain baguette, with a little bit of butter. With the occasional pain au chocolat (chocolate is another food group, isn’t it?). Ah well, we are in France after all.

 This is our chalet.

 And this is the view from our chalet!

 Zoe in the main square.

 On our first hike (very gentle) to see a glacier.

 In town.

 Enjoying one of many, many croissants

Enjoying one of many, many sorbets (citron the current fave, but we are determined to work our way through ALL the flavours).

Getting ready

Welcome to the start of my blog! I'm intending (hoping?) to update this blog during our year abroad in Chamonix, France so our friends and family can follow our progress. For those of you who don't know... we're spending a year in France. Surprise! Our good friends, Pete and Les, invited us to come and spend a year next door to them in Chamonix, and it was an offer we couldn't refuse. So I've got leave from my teaching job, we've registered the girls in schools in Cham, my cousin from Scotland is coming to our house for the year with her kids to have her own adventure here in Canada, and we're off.

One week until we leave... are we ready? Of course not. But many things have been packed, many things have been cleared, many things checked off the list. Sadly, leaving our gorgeous dog Piper with my parents for the year is one of them. That's probably going to be the hardest part - although we know he is going to be incredibly well looked after and loved by my mum and dad (thanks again, M&D) we're going to miss him terribly, and I know he's going to miss us. But there's always Skype...

And just to settle a few commonly asked questions:

1. 'Are the girls excited to go to France for the year?' I believe overall the answer is 'yes', although as Indra told me the other day when asked, 'I'm not excited, but I am pleased'. The distinction? I'm not sure, but Indie seemed to see one. But I also feel they've got some great 'double think' going on, as in they're excited for all the wonderful things we're planning to do in France (the skiing, the hiking, living next door to our good friends, the many baguettes and crepes we are planning on eating) but they're also planning their lives as usual here - what they're going to wear for Halloween, inviting friends for sleepovers, planning Christmas with their cousins etc. They don't seem to realize that the two lives can't, and won't, co-exist. So I think we'll be in for a bit of a shock after the novelty of being in France wears off and they realize they're there for the year. I anticipate a few tears from four-year-old Zoe and some emphatic 'I want to go home's, as we had recently on our two-week camping trip to PEI. But we'll see...

2. Are we going to want to come back after the year is up? I'm not sure why so many people are determined to predict that we won't return after our year away (don't they want us to come back?), but let me say once again that we WILL be back next August. I have a JOB for one thing, a job that I love. Plus we have a house. Family. Friends. And a great life here in Baie d'Urfe. Don't get me wrong, I'm very excited for this adventure, but as Toby observed today as we enjoyed another beautiful summer's day in our garden, life is pretty good here too!

So obviously no exciting pictures to post yet of our exciting new life in France (gimme a week!) but I thought I would post a picture of our gorgeous boy, Piper (missing him already).

T minus 7 days. Watch this space...