A Most Fabulous Trip!

The trip to Avignon for Cecile's......and Deb's .....50th birthday celebration was absolutely the most wonderful time. Sightseeing, eating, drinking wine, dancing, eating some more, drinking more wine, conversation, shopping. It was the BEST! I tried to limit this to the 10 best photos. Well, there are 15, I couldn't help it. The sights are very beautiful, but the people that welcomed us were even more so.





Shopping in Avignon....Cecile, Marcy and Deb carrying quite a few packages. Remember ladies, these things have to fit in the suitcases on the way back.....





A day to visit Anne. Her lovely kitchen and house, her wonderful cooking. Pastis! A pomegranate tree right outside her kitchen door. Dancing....there was even dancing. Please notice the BOOTS that Cecile and Anne have on....low-heeled, beautiful. The American Girls are coveting those boots!




A french meal lasts a couple of hours.....wine, appetizers, salad and bread, the main course, cheese and bread, deserts.....oh and wine. This day there were THREE deserts! Anne was such a friend to us.....showing us many places....feeding us a fabulous french meal.




Speaking of food.....ah, the bread......




Cecile astonished us with her parallel parking abilities. Notice....only 2 inches, at most!....on either end of that car. She did it, she really did! Amazing and impressive, Cecile!




The view overlooking Marseilles....to the Mediterranean....




Is this building beautiful or what?! Going to the Van Gogh exhibit....





The Three Musketeers at a sail boat harbor in Marseilles...



I have so many photos of beautiful places, which of course, are better in person. But the thing that I thought was the best about the trip was the people.....relatives and friends....that we met. I LOVED Cecile's party! So many people came to celebrate Cecile. Ruth, Cecile's friend from Chicago is there in the middle. There was such a warm feeling celebrating the adventurous and lovely person that is Cecile. Dancing! Champagne! Eating! (of course) Singing! Wine! Karioke! Laughing! So much FUN!





Nicole, Cecile's mom, was so good to us! And she was so much fun. And she cooked so much for us. I cannot imagine a warmer welcome. Nicole had been learning english for a couple of months; I had studied up on my rusty french....hahaha. Every morning we tried, at least we tried, to make sense of what each of us had to say. We did OK though it tired out my brain. With our dictionaries and with our hands we supplemented our limited vocabulary....we got quite a few laughs.





Oh Lola! Such a sweet friend. She loved having the Americans dropping little morsels for her. I suspect she's still getting little morsels even though we're gone.....





Cecile, Anne, Nicole and Christiane singing karioke. I don't know what the song is. When it was our turn to sing, we did "It's raining men!" It was lucky that we got help from Cecile and friends.





Cecile with Jean, her cousin, and his wife, Marie-France. They have the vinyard and beautiful old house where the party was held. This is a very lively couple!! So much exuberance!





I will have to say, there was never one moment, not one, where I wasn't having a wonderful time. Marie-France had just served us tea and we were having a great laugh over something....maybe about the other American who joined us....the small one.... there in Anne's hand.