Thursday 13

13 days of holsa quick revision
click on pics to enlarge
Day 1: Getting ready to go hiking in the French Alps for a week, followed by wining, dining and sightseeing (the latter includes window shopping as well, of course!) in Rapallo and Genova (Italy) plus Marseille (France)

Day 2: Off around 8 am, first stop in Perpignan, which is the first French town after the Spanish border. Lunch in Montpellier. Heat wave didn't stay in Spain, it came along with us...

Day 3: First hiking day, found small, tasty wild strawberries along the road! and a local festival in the next village, 5 minutes by foot. They had a menu for 10 euro/ 12.7 USD which included a kir , my very favorite before dinner drink when in France, half a cantaloupe filled with port wine, a very tasty tartiflette with a pretty, very thin slice of cold, smoked ham and a wonderful floating island for dessert. Plus wine, of course! (click to enlarge)

Day 4: Visited a cheese farm (La Chasse), specialized in producing beaufort cheese, so they had Tarantise cows, the brown ones (!). It used to be a refuge for hunters , so the name of it "La Chasse", The Hunt. Had a small guided tour of the area surrounding the farm, which happens to be in our snow ski paradise . It was a very different perspective this time! and we got to walk down the slopes. I must admit it is a lot more fun on skis, but that is a very personal opinion!

Day 5: Four hours of hiking , walking through small villages, taking pics of the beautiful scenery, plants, alpine flowers and the like. While the mountains are absolutely quiet in the winter time when they are covered by snow, there is so much "noise" and wild activity in the summer: water falls from the mountains, bugs, animals, it was just wonderful. Remember I am a city person easily impressed by Mother Nature, never lived in the country side! The other next village had a biking festival and we couldn't possibly miss the fun . They had a simpler menu than the one on Day 3: spaghetti bolognese, crunchy slice of fresh bread, a peach and a glass of wine. For 6 euros/ 7.7 USD.

Day 6: Highlight of the day was to see a small fox early in the morning right in front of our window, but it took me long seconds to get my camera ready and I could only get his back... Use your imagination, click to enlarge and maybe you can see him too!

Day 7: Hiking to Lac (lake) de Lou. Handycraft festival in the afternoon, which had an early end due to a thunder storm.

Day 8. Hiking!! wanted to visit an old mill but took a short walk instead due to a very dark sky and high risk of thunder storms again. So we took the car in the afternoon to visit a near by ski center which is not connected to "ours" in the winter time: Valmorel. Temperature dropped from 27ºC/80ºF to 12ºC/53ºF on our short way back!

Day 9: left the mountains heading to Italy. There is a tunnel connecting the ski stations in France with Turin, Italy, but we took the Col de L'Iseran (2,770 m/9,090 ft, the second highest pass of the Alps, my source of information is Mr Mar but he doesn't remember which one is the highest ...) and enjoyed the beautiful scenery! Watched all those bikers work hard their way up the mountain and enjoy the way down... Arrival in Rapallo, Italian Riviera, beautiful place, many tourists, excellent ice cream!

Day 10: Walk through Rapallo and another ice cream for Mr Mar before leaving to Genova. His very favorite: hazelnuts and lemon. Dinner at a great terrace right next to the Med. Great atmosphere is just too little to say, it was wonderful! Couldn't take my digital cam along since it was a rather formal event (the blogger in me suffered through the whole thing because I wanted to photograph everything! but the party lady enjoyed the evening very much!)

Day 11: Walking in Genova. I took many pictures which I will share shortly! and then off to Marseille, driving along the Cote d'Azur with the fancy exits: Monaco, Nice, Cannes...

Day 12: Marseille, oh la la! Wonderful dinner overlooking the Vieux Port (old port) and a beautiful sunset as the prettiest decorative element.
Day 13: lunch with this beautiful view of the old port in Marseille (right picture) speaking French ( I tried my best) and back home in a little over 5 hours, traffic wasn't bad at all! Stay tuned for more pics !

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