Finally France

Stall at the beautiful famer's market in Annecy.


Sausage is way better in France!


Flower shop in Annecy.




Volnay from WWI and WWII era! Anyone want to guess a price?


Ready to be bottled in the coolest wine cellar ever.


Can't leave France without a picture of a bicycle leaning agains a wall.

I have been back from France for a couple of weeks and still no blog post. My apologies. I do finally have my photos up at http://picasaweb.google.com/pearen/France

France was great! Having a car was key to a successful trip. Maybe not quite as good as two months and a bike with panniers, but driving all the back roads through tiny towns was definitely a highlight of the trip. Becca and I started by heading down to Montpellier where she has been studying for the past year. On the way we stopped by the Roquefort cheese caves for a pretty cheesy tour. After a day checking out Montpellier and visiting the market we were off again to the Alps. This ended up being quite a long day in the car, mostly because it was so beautiful and we kept wanting to check out new stuff.

In the Alps we had a small chalet reserved for 6 nights. It served as a perfect base for relaxing, hiking, eating cheese and exploring the surrounding villages. We were in the small town of Combloux down the valley from Chamonix. One of our most impressive side trips was to Annecy. This small city had a fabulous market and was right on the outlet of a beautiful glacial lake with crystal clear streams running right through town. I don't say this often while travelling, but I actually think I could live in this area.

After leaving the Alps with sore bellies from all the cheese, we moved onto wine country. We started with wonderful Pinot and Chardonnay on the Cote d' Or in Burgogna. We had quite a fun day checking out wine cellars and tasting tons of wines. Every vintner has a couple of acres of grapes and there are literally hundreds of small family operations in about a 50km strip of hillside. Most make amazing wine. After a night in a wonderful small town bead and breakfast, we decided to get closer to Paris and check out Champagna. Again, we found tons of little family wineries making incredible bubbly wine. I ended up bringing a few bottles back.