Home invasion

The place where we live is being overrun by ducks. We must have about fifty of them at least. We always had ducks here, perhaps about 10 at a time on average. They qwacked away merrily and gladly scoffed down people's leftover bread when lunch time was over. Then, at the beginning of spring one female had her first lot of babies... 10 of them. Just as those babies started growing, another female had another lot... of 9. Before we knew it we'd lost count. They are so cute as babies that none of us could resist feeding them to encourage them to come close. Well the result of this now is (as you will see in the picture above left) that they no longer fear humans one bit and just see us as a meal ticket. This poor man was peacefully walking home after work and about 25 ducks were there ready to pounce him!
As you can see here on the right, even the babies joined in and the poor man had to use his secret human weapon... the shoe. Yes, one day one near-adult duck got so uptight with me that I had to gently boot him up the bum to remind him that yes! we are to be feared!
I'm kind of worried that some evil person will look at them one day and just see pate de foie gras and these poor ducks will not know fear of humans and will have no defences.
It is pretty cool watching them all grow up though, starting to get their colours, learning to fly, learning to stray away from mum. Sometimes the babies come right up to you and nibble your toes in the hopes of finding some stray breadcrumb.
The ponds, on the other hand, are being overrun by lotus flowers, which always make for some nice afternoon photo sessions.
So there you have a little piece of our world as it is right now.
Tomorrow we head off to Montpellier for some camping by the sea and to catch up with a very good friend of ours from Montreal. We get back on Sunday night! Next week I might be motivated enough to share with you some of my driving experiences (YES! I've started my driving lessons!) and my bike-riding progress (YES! that too!)
Until then... Come on Aussie Come on! for Sunday arvo and Allez les Bleus! for Sunday evening
P.S: to see the pictures a little better you can click on them

Little trips to Spain

A couple of weeks ago Remi had an ex-colleague/friend visiting from Montreal, so we headed off for a few days of discovery in Basque Country, taking full advantage of the 4 day long weekend in honour of the ascension of Christ, the 40th day of Easter.
Basque Country (Euskal Herria in Basque) is made up of 3 provinces on the French side and 4 on the Spanish. Remi's mother now lives on the French side, in Bayonne on the Atlantic Coast. Bayonne is famous for its "ferias", its ham, and apparently its chocolate. Trivia: linguists still have no clue as to the origins of the Basque language, which it has to be said is quite strange.
We arrived early afternoon on the Wednesday and after a tasty lunch set off to the beach at Anglet and then on to Biarritz, a playground for the rich (once a favourite holiday spot of the British royal family) and favourite spot for surfers.
The next day we set off to St Jean de Luz then over the Spanish border onto Hondarribia, stopping for a picnic between the two at a choice cliff-edge spot looking out over the ocean. They are both lovely towns, though St Jean de Luz could be considered more of a playground for the rich and Hondarribia has more character with its colourful fishermen's houses.
[...] I have to admit that first part was written just a couple of days after our return and I hadn't had a chance to get back to it since. As such, I have forgotten the details of the trip such as what day we did what. What I can tell you is that we went to Bilbao to visit the Guggenheim museum and you will see in the photos that this building truly is amazing, all made of titanium, sandstone and glass. Once there we got to see the Russia! exhibition, apparently the largest collection to ever have left Russia and some of it was awe-inspiring... namely standing in front of a Rubens portrait and wondering how the hell. Some are so well captured in paint that they literally look like photographs.
We also visited San Sebastian, a city burnt down to the ground in 1813 by English and Portuguese and then rebuilt. For a while it was the Summer residence of the Spanish royal family and also a playground for the rich! Quite a lovely city, it would be nice to go back there one day and spend a little more time.
We also stopped by Guernica which we very much liked and appreciated even more thanks to the friendly bar we visited where they served us some delicious tapas for a very good price... so be sure to stop off at Auzokoa if ever you happen by Guernica with a rumble in your tummy!
Some of you may actually have heard of Guernica because of Picasso's famous depiction of the Guernica massacre... "the first aerial bombardment in history in which a civilian population was attacked with the apparent intent of producing total destruction." (...) "aerial bombardment in history in which a civilian population was attacked with the apparent intent of producing total destruction." (ref. wikipedia entry). Very interesting from a modern history point of view.
Anyhow all these places have a very interesting past and for those who are curious I highly recommend searching Wikipedia for more info.
And last but not least we visited the lovely little town of Espelette, famous for its red Espelette chilis. All in all, a great 5 days! Click here to go to the photo album in the galleries section.

Toooooooo funny!

I was sitting here proofreading a friend's report because she has to hand it in tomorrow and had to write it in English. Remi was out and the TV was just background noise I had no trouble tuning out, until Remi came home and started laughing, saying "do you know what you're watching on TV?". "No, I wasn't watching, I was working." "You didn't hear anything strange?". "No, I really wasn't paying attention". Turns out the TV was tuned to a channel that plays soft porn this late at night. So Remi goes off to the shower chuckling and I suddenly become too aware of the sound of this TV program. I get up to go turn it off and to my surprise, who do I see in the starring role?
CAMERON DADDO!!! hahahaha! couldn't believe it! I guess it would have been done some years ago but still! Cracked me up, had to share it... and no, I didn't stick around to see him butt naked :D