A pictorial collection of our journey to France

Paris’s iconic Eiffel Tower

Caroline Nin sings a Hymn to Piaf in Paris last year.

Shakespeare and Company bookshop on Quay Montabello opposite Notre Dame

What better way to illustrate the exciting journey I experienced with my friend Jane in France than to show a few photographs. No explanation needed for the first photograph…The Eiffel Tower, or in French Tour Eiffel. French chanteuse sings Hymn to Piaf in a 13th century cellar far below the streets of Paris on the 50th anniversary of Piaf’s death.

The Loire Valley’s fairytale chateau of Chenonceau, arguably the most beautiful in the world, was home  to five remarkable women over a  300 year period  – and they preserved it for us to enjoy today.

Musee du Louvre on the banks of the Seine

Jane and I paused in a rose arbour before beginning a spellbinding tour of Villandry, in the Loire Valley which boasts the last restored Renaissance garden in France.

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2 Comments to “A pictorial collection of our journey to France”

  1. By Jo, 27/06/2017 @ 8:15 am

    Hi Nadine, I’m terribly sorry for your loss. I’m a fellow Aussie wondering if it is easy for an Aussie to ” fit in” in France? France fascinates me, I have visited twice and still need to visit again. I do not speak French, is it fairly easy to “pick up” or learn? What about the Governmental side of France, is it easy for an Aussie to live in France?
    I would be very happy for your response. Where in OZ are you from? Me, Brisbane.

    Kind Regards.. Jo [ Female ]

    • By nadine, 27/06/2017 @ 8:37 am

      Hi Jo, Lovely to get your comment. I don’t get many these days. I think it would be quite difficult to meld into a French community, but Australians are held in fond regard by the French. However, there is a natural reserve which French women apply to other women, which we don’t experience here. There isn’t the girlfriend life. It is very much a couple society, although affairs are much more prevalent, which explains the reservation of women to make friends.
      Presently I have a girlfriend who is spending six months in France with an Aussie girlfriend and this seems to be the way to do it. It would be impossible without the language unless you settled yourself into one of those villages in the Lot, abandoned by the French but inhabited in summer by the English. I did two courses at Alliance Francaise and wherever you did that, either Paris, or the regions, it’s a good starting point. Learning French is a ” work in progress” but I do speak French at my author talks. Have you bought my new memoir yet? Farewell My French Love? It documents my journey back from grief but also three weeks with my girlfriend Jane, and then three weeks by myself. I boarded with a French woman attending Alliance Francaise during the day. It was a wonderful way to find my own identity again. I hope to bring my book to Alliance in Brisbane before the end of the year, but I have been quite ill and need to rest for a month or so – “Type A flu”. If you give me your phone number, I shall contact you when my Brisbane visit is imminent.
      There is indeed something magical about Paris – and I found it to resurrect myself. I go to France every few years and I have made French friends through the lyceum Club. There is a Lyceum Club in Brisbane and the international element is so exciting as it is a world-wide club, but it’s for older women and I don’t know your age. Would love to know a little more about yourself. kind regards, Nadine Williams Foubert, OAM>

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