Lost in Provence

Staycation: Day Six

nobody@vox.com(Lisa Pepin) — Thu, 13 Aug 2009 01:23:36 -0700

I think this was my favorite of this year's Staycation days. We went to Porquerolles, which is an island just off the coast of France, near Hyères. The island is small, just 7km by 3km, and is a protected nature reserve. There are no hotels on t...

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Staycation: Day Five

nobody@vox.com(Lisa Pepin) — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 03:04:34 -0700

On Saturday we drove Johann's grandparents to visit an old friend of theirs. Jacqueline (Jackie) Talouarn and Marco (Johann's grandfather) knew each other during the war. She was married to Jean LeGalleu, who was the head of Marco's resistance g...

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Staycation: Day Four

nobody@vox.com(Lisa Pepin) — Sun, 09 Aug 2009 05:13:10 -0700

I'm so far behind! Day four of our Staycation was last Tuesday, and while there's not a lot to report from it, we still really enjoyed ourselves. In the morning we went kayaking on the Durance, which was deliciously cool and refreshing in this ...

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Staycation: Day Three

nobody@vox.com(Lisa Pepin) — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 14:18:57 -0700

Day three of this August's Staycation found us in Châteauneuf du Pape. Sound familiar? It's more than just fancy wine, it's a whole REGION of fancy wine. We set the GPS for the general area and when we got close, we just drove in the direction o...

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Staycation: Day Two

nobody@vox.com(Lisa Pepin) — Mon, 03 Aug 2009 02:58:42 -0700

Day two of our staycation started with a bang. Literally. We were woken at 7.00 a.m. by a thunderstorm so loud and violent that I reverted to my six-year-old self, pulling the covers over my head and reminding myself again and again, "The thunder...

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Staycation: Day One

nobody@vox.com(Lisa Pepin) — Sat, 01 Aug 2009 14:03:31 -0700

It's that time of year again! You often hear that nobody works in August in Europe. That's because it's true. But instead of taking off one entire week, like last year, Johann is taking two four-day weekends in a row (I know. It's rough to be him...

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Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Champagne...

nobody@vox.com(Lisa Pepin) — Tue, 14 Jul 2009 03:47:15 -0700

We learned a lot on our trip to the Champagne region. We got a complete tour of the Devaux facilities and saw Champagne being bottled right before our very eyes. Devaux is the fifth-largest Champagne maker in the world and produces bubbly for l...

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Bonjour from the Champagne Region!

nobody@vox.com(Lisa Pepin) — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 08:01:01 -0700

Bonjour from France's Champagne region! The trip started well, with first class seats on the TGV from Marseille to Dijon. The high-speed train moves too fast for photos of the countryside to look like anything but a blur (at least, with my came...

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Cead Mille Failte from Ireland!

nobody@vox.com(Lisa Pepin) — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 02:20:07 -0700

Hello from Ireland, where the hills were green and rolling and the beer was brown and flowing! We spent ten glorious days there with our best friends from Chicago, Ed and Cindy, plus his parents and her parents. There were four nights in Dublin,...

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Bonjour from Fréjus!

nobody@vox.com(Lisa Pepin) — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 08:12:06 -0700

Greetings from the Côte d'Azur, where we spent a wonderful week with my parents. I'm afraid that I don't have a lot to report from this trip. We may have set a new world record for lolling about, but quite frankly, I'm feeling too lazy to submit...

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