Silke and Christian

On Saturday, Silke and Christian picked us up in Meerssen on their way from Hannover and we all headed together on a whole day odyssey to the south of France. With the guidance of “Ms Media” who always assured us we would be there soon and to take the “zweite Ausfahrt” at each roundabout, we made it to the villa, just outside of Oloron, near midnight.

S&C spent the whole next week with us. We enjoyed each other’s company and were glad to be together again since we’d had such a good time with each other when Silke was in Canada. We sat out on the veranda eating beautiful cheese and drinking good wine, (or gin tonics). One evening we played Phase 10 till late in the night.

We went on day trips into the Pyrérnées on very windy, narrow roads. We marveled at the beautiful countryside and drove through small, quaint, old, closed up villages it seemed. One day we drove out to the Atlantic Coast and spent some time at the beach at St Jean de Luz. We waved to Evan and John at the other side of the Atlantic in Newfoundland. We spent a day walking around in Pau, the larger town closest to the villa. One day we walked the 4 km to the Bidos roundabout to see the Tour de France coming through on their way into the mountains. That was very cool. Although we spent a lot of time waiting, which got a little boring. We didn’t know what time the riders were expected so we made a wild, educated guess and found ourselves there 2 hours early. Fortunately, there was a parade which preceded the arrival of the cyclists. These were mostly advertisers waving and throwing samples of their wares. Finally the cyclists arrived. They zipped by so fast we hardly knew what had happened. First the first 7, then 2 more, then the whole big group, all of it finished in about 15 seconds. A 2 hour wait, for 15 seconds. But it’s a story to tell!

Silke, in particular, enjoyed playing a number of games…including the punch buggy game and the counting, clapping ritual in the car, and going for rides in the kiddie cars at the grocery stores. My favourite Silke moment was when we were in Bayonne after having had a lovely Basque dinner. We walked back to the car and suddenly it started raining many heavy, big rain drops. Larry, Christian and I took shelter under a bus stop while Silke danced and shouted in the rain, calling “It’s just summer snow!” It was a perfect picture of who Silke is!

We were so happy to spend this time together with both Silke and Christian.