Yall! I’m doing it, I’m finally wrapping up our April Europe trip with this post! Without even trying, because it’s been in chronological order, I’ve saved the best for last :)
We really can’t brag enough about Fat Tire tour company! We love them and trusted them with a big percentage of our Spain and France trips. This tour was also through them and was definitely a highlight for me. It was a full day trip, 8.5 hours to be exact. We started with meeting at the storefront and packing up in a bus heading to Normandy, specifically a village called Vernon. When we arrived we walked to a mini storage that was so old and rustic it made America’s public storage facilities look like something out of 2089. From there we saddled up our bikes and hit up the Market of Vernon.
Not only were these strawberries seriously the best I’ve ever had, literally melting in your mouth, they smelled so fragrant too!
Give me all the local French cheese please!
This farmer was so cute! I asked if we could eat these raw on our picnic and he told me in broken English that’d we’d die sooo, while cute, I passed on these shrooms!
After we had our free time to roam the market grabbing whatever we wanted to nosh on we loaded up and biked to the Seine.
Our haul~ Most sourced from the farmers market and a few others from local shops. We got local cheese, those strawberries I mentioned, a savory tart, salmon yogurt cups, fresh bread, pistachio dessert bars and to wash it all down we sipped on wine (not pictured) and the infamous boozy cider.
The view from this blanket looked something like…..
Seine River, France
Amateur move blowing out the highlights of the cheese, wish you could see more details but I’m at least glad I captured the pressed fern on the goat milk piece.
After taking pics of all our sexy food scores, we barely had time to eat (Sorry Dustin!) but we packed up what we didn’t scarf down for later as it was time for the gardens in Giverny.
To get there, we biked through and saw houses and structures dating back to the 15th century! I snapped a blurry pic from my bike but I’ll save your eyes. Read more about it here.
~TO THE GARDENS~
Missing lily pads (they weren’t in season) but do you recognize that bridge off in the distance?!?! We were so ecstatic to see this in real life! Monet is D’s favorite artist so even more so for him <3
As you can imagine, I was going bonkers taking flower photos-here’s some of my favorites:
The Mark III features in camera double exposure ability which we had fun playing around with~
Doesn’t this just scream inspiration for him!?
They don’t even look real….
Tail end of the tour was walking through his house-his pale pink and green house! It was colorful inside and out- filled to the ceilings with all kinds of art and decor. Just wait till you scroll down and see the kitchen!
THAT OVEN! THAT BACKSPLASH!
The man had a legit collection of copper pots and if I had the same, I’d display them proudly too!
After walking through his home (but not doing the full tour-no AC, shoulder to shoulder with slow af tourists *least favorite thing in the entire realm of traveling* long legs and a mission people-out of my way!) we hit up the gift shop, bought a print and then moved on to tastier things.
Rose in a garden anyone?
Along the street to his home there are shops and restaurants aligning the narrow paved road. Somewhere between his grave site and just outside of the gift shop we wandered into this part garden store, part bar/cafe, part farm? Not really sure but it can’t be missed! As in it’s easy to find and you should really go. Do you really want to miss out on these afro chicks?
Last pit stop of our tour included going to his grave site where he lays with lots of family and flowers, naturally.
His headstone was the only one cracked. Not sure what to make of that but doesn’t seem like anyone’s fixing it any time soon.
Can not put into words for you how special this was! If you are in Paris and can spare a full day, this is a MUST DO. Hell, we wanna do it again some time, it’s that good.
More information on the tour we took here.
2 Comments
Natasha
December 22, 2017 at 4:49 pmReally beautiful post! I went to France when I was 16 and want to go back!
Aunt Kelli
December 24, 2017 at 2:17 pmThese pics are amazing! I would love to see this in person!