Home alone

Well the child is in France and we are left moping around the house without her. However, even though she is not here, somehow we end up doing a Guide thing anyway. She's raising money for her Japan Jamboree trip in 2015 and the Guide leader said we could do a craft stall at the coffee morning. 

Cue finger puppet rabbits and 'Totes Amaze Bags'

We set up our stall, we purchase coffee and cake. There's loads of cake. We await the villagers. Make finger puppets and they will come! 

Our punters arrive, mainly of the older generation very keen on the idea of a chin wag, a cup of coffee and cake. It was a lovely raucous village atmosphere. All were appreciative of our crafts, plenty of purchases made, we ate loads of cake, took cake home and caught up with neighbours. Then...as if that wasn't an exciting enough day - a trip to the tip. Yay! 

Duck or canard?

Part deux of the French experience

What could top celebrating Burns night for a French teenage experience of Derbyshire life? A trip down a dark cave and scrambling into a boat might not be everyone's cup of tea…but that was what we did.

We drive though the pretty villages of the Hope Valley to the destination of Castleton, famous for it’s Blue John, stalactites and stalagmites. OK, who can tell me how you tell the difference? I was taught stalactites need to hang on tight to the ceiling, and stalagmites need to be mighty strong to build up from the ground. Oh yes - Blue John is actually blue…I’ll be testing you later.

I find a guidebook to the speedwell cavern in French…result. I give this to Clara and the French contingent gather round and read about what was to be expected for the next hour. I find the guide to ask if he knows any French…he doesn’t (except bon-jaw N.B. his accent was way worse than mine.)

We don protective headgear and stumble en masse down the 900 steps to the awaiting boat. In which we are treated to a ride in the cold dark tunnel, accompanied by the guide telling us about the history of mining in a fairly strong Derbyshire accent. Not sure our French students will have covered coal mining, child exploitation and controlled explosions in their English lessons; at least they have the book. There was a particularly low bit of the tunnel and we were encouraged to ‘duck’. I shouted ‘canard’ to alert the French. Apparently its not the same! Amused my fellow English passengers though.

We get out of the boat, we admire the cavern, we take photos, we stare at our shoes, we take a few more photos having convinced ourselves that there is definitely no 3G signal and clamber into the next boat with relief. The tour guide has some funny stories about previous questions from tourists - for example “How many undiscovered caverns are there?” and “Can I take my hat off, I keep banging my head” And I thought the duck joke sank!

Back on the surface, we decide to go for a hot chocolate and perhaps some cake, we felt we deserved it. However, there were eight adults and 10 children in our party. So the Castleton carnival begins. I’m not sure why we ALL felt the need to traipse into every cafe, establish that the remaining one table and three chairs was not sufficient for our party, cause a log jam in the doorway then tramp to the next establishment, but that was what we did. I am sure we are still the talk of the village. At last, a restaurant agreed to make us a hot drink and feed us cake - phew!

Parlez-vous Franglais?

The other week our linguistic skills had a grand workout. We had a French exchange student staying with us so a dusting off of our schoolgirl French was the ordre du jour.

All went well, I quickly learn not to start challenging conversations. For example - launching into a conversation about the history of Sheffield, the steel industry and engineering taught at the University may have been a bridge too far, or pont trop loin even.

We bamboozled the lovely Clara with the Great British Bake Off (with celebrities) on the telly, a trip to the Co-Op, shopping at Meadowhall and an early celebration of Burns night with friends. Yes that’s right, Burns night. You know, because of the strong links between Derbyshire and Scotland.   

I’m not sure how well toasting the meal with whiskey, reading a poem to a plate of unrecognisable food and bagpipes being played with varying levels of skill can be translated to young French people. There was, however, lots of laughter, back up pizza and a movie to watch, which suited everybody.

Some of the laughter was in response to my attempts at the French language. When I was helping clear up “assiette coming through,” which in my mind was a good approximation both French and English all could understand, caused a significant amount of amusement. I was just pleased to remember what the French for plate was. 

Mmmm...bon appetite!

The boys were back in town

An impromptu road trip for our French boys was a lovely New Year’s Eve surprise. A trip to the Hepworth was in order to show off Yorkshire’s cultural side. 

We squashed in to the car and headed for Wakefield. 

The advantage of going NYE is the lack of competition for a parking space, we achieved a boss one and headed on in. 

We had fed the boys a massive brunch in the form of English breakfast - enough bacon to sustain a person for a considerable amount of time. So, of course, the cafe is the first place we went to! After all, our cake levels must have been at an all time seasonal low by this point. The cafe is lovely - good food, friendly staff and the afternoon wintery light was beautiful.

Fortified with cake, hot chocolate and fizzy pop, we headed for the art. As always, all were  impressed by the Hepworth’s collection and intrigued by the visiting shows. Photos of favorite pieces were shot. To the shop then!

NYE was topped off by a top evening at friends in Sheffield - more than happy to include our boys at short notice. Hosts and other guests alike had to kiss everyone twice because of the French element. This seemed to go down well. Our hosts provided a delicious buffet and we then all played a game based on food and etiquette - not my strong point. The boys were happy; a significant number of questions began "What region in France…" They were, however, unhappy when we lost by one point due to a question concerning Finland. C'est la vie.

We waved adieu to the lovely boys on a very rainy New Years Day, making sure they left with a large slab of cake to be consumed in emergencies! We all hope they come again soon.

Anyone fancy a swim?

France part two

La Piscine

Lars and Maisie

Our dear friend Lars took us into Roubaix to the swimming pool - La piscine. No not for swimming as one might expect, but for art purposes. The old Art Deco swimming pool in the town, is now La Piscine - the Museum of Art and Industry, and is a beautiful setting for a great collection of drawings, painting, sculptures and textiles. There is still a suggestion of pool, and every little while the sound of swimming pool joviality is played over the loud speakers for a few seconds. Fantastic - we all loved it!

The visit was made even more interesting, one of the curators known to Lars (the benefits of knowing a local) gave Maisie some smelly bits of paper (like perfume samples) which were supposed to match up to certain paintings. A project by a local artist I think. 


Off we trekked to find the corresponding paintings - first up 'Combat de coqs en Flandre'  Remy Cogghe 1889 - not my favourite subject matter, or my favourite smell it would seem. The paper was impregnated with a smell reminiscent of stale tobacco and sweat. Yuk!  After a sniff of the pool (fairly realistic), and an assassination (fairly unpleasant and unplaceable) we found a still life of a breakfast setting. When we opened the bag with the smelly paper, we were pleasantly surprised and relived to sniff le petit dejeuner  - chocolate and while linen. Yum - off to patisserie again? Why not, we are in France after all.