France: Part 1

I just can't seem to get ahead this week. I'm finally getting over the jetlag, and wham! TC gives me the cold/flu that he picked up on the last day of our trip. I suppose it shouldn't surprise me, but I tried so hard not to get it - washing my hands, using sanitizer, making him sleep on the futon, taking my vitamins and echinacea. Alas, all to no avail. So today, instead of going to work I am sitting on my couch watching the Price is Right, blowing my way through my second box of kleenex, drinking orange juice and blogging :)

On the bright side, that means I have time to post some more pictures! Here are some of the highlights of our first full day in France (the day we arrived was pretty much a write-off).

We spent the first part of our trip visiting with our friends JP & KP, who moved to Nancy earlier this year. Nancy, which is in Lorraine, is a beautiful city, so we spent the day exploring it. The picture above was taken in Place Stanislas, the huge town square which is surrounded by all of this beautiful gilded ironwork. The downtown area of the city is very cute and medieval, with tiny winding streets, and lots of interesting little shops. And it's only slightly touristy :)

After looking around downtown, JP & KP (that's them walking down the lane - aren't they cute?) took us to the Pépinière, a public garden. Let me say right now that the French definitely have the whole public space thing down pat. And their gardens and parks? Beautiful!

Except for the knobby trees, which were everywhere. Apparently they cut them back like this every year so that they form specific shapes when the leaves bloom. This one will look like a square, or so I was told.

The rest of it was amazing, though. Lush green everywhere we looked, and quite a few flowers though there aren't any in this picture. No, that's not true - you can see some white ones through the arch if you look closely.

The park also had a little zoo, which contained these guys, among other animals. The ape, whose name was JoJo, took a real liking to TC and came right over to see him when we walked by his enclosure. I'm tempted to conjecture as to why the attraction to TC, but it might be best if I refrain from doing so :)

Now that's a clock! It was right on time too, which means I took this picture at around 1:40pm. Just around the corner from here was a long lane that was lined with tents housing the wares of every patisserie in town, who were there to celebrate the "Fete du Pain". We sat on a bench for a while and just breathed in the smell of fresh bread. And listened to the really bad English techno-dance music that seems to be so popular in France.

We ended our day with a walk through a different part of town, where we saw this rainbow. How perfect is that?