A breath of fresh air

This past weekend I found myself escaping to the countryside. It was, officially 'last minute.' I'd been craving to get out of Paris for a while (I was in the UK twice in May) but the opportunity hadn't really presented itself since then. Thanks to my colleague Paul I have been introduced to quite a lot of new people which has really made a difference to my knowledge of Paris (and beyond!) A lot of Paul's friends grew up here, or went to college here so they know so much more than I do about Paris. One of his friends, a lovely girl called Shona, has a holiday house in Samois-sur-Seine, just 40 minutes from Paris. A group of people were all heading there for the weekend and although I had been invited I had to work. Finally I decided (if it was okay with Shona) that I would work on Saturday and arrive afterwards. I needed a break from Paris and this was the perfect opportunity, plus I got to see Shona and talk to her more (before this weekend we had only met once properly).

Anyway I arrive around half past four and everything was running smoothly until.......I waited for an hour for a bus that never arrived. The boys had assured me the buses were running but after a long time we realised that most buses were running but not those to Samois sur Seine. So, finally I decided to try and take a taxi. At this point there were no taxis, I had already missed the only one I had seen at the train station and there didn't seem to be any in the taxi rank nor on the road. I was, apparently, stuck. Now, I love walking so again this did not seem to cause a problem so I called Dave and declared I was going to walk because I was pretty fed up with the bus and taxi situation. It turned out that it was too far to walk so very kindly Paul called a taxi to come and pick me up. I finally got to the house about an hour and a half after I arrived at the station and the first thing I did was open a beer. Bit of a palava but everything was alright in the end and it was definitely worth the wait.

I arrived finally in a tiny village that was full of cute little houses, brasseries, not a single cash point, one tiny boulangerie (bakery) and one tiny corner shop. And finally...I could inhale deeply without coughing, such a relief from the polluted city air! Saturday evening was spent drinking, eating and playing drinking games which always ended in laughter. We had to first describe someone without saying who they were, then we could only give one word to describe the person and finally we had to mime. As the game got more and more difficult and we drank more and more beer some people came out with some ridiculous mimes particularly for Charles de Gaulle. We had a walk down to the river where some of the guys played the guitar and we all wrapped up in blankets looking at the stars.

Sunday was spent relaxing, eating and drinking (again) and after lunch Dave, Paul and I took a walk down to the riverside to take some photographs (as the night before had been too dark and too alcohol based...ha). The riverside was beautiful and it was so nice to see genuine cobbled streets and old buildings. Samois sur Seine is also where Jazz artist Django Reinhardt retired and each year they have an annual Jazz festival in his honour. It was so great just to explore somewhere so green and I was so surprised that there were such nice little villages so close to the centre of Paris, most people don't know they even exist!

Thank you to everyone (especially Shona for allowing me to join you) for this lovely weekend a la campagne!