a new wind: Two bikes, clear skies, and a camera

It’s the start of my winter vacation and I am glad to say that I spent it by the water. Not exactly the beach, but definitely a bigger body of water than the Oise River that runs through Creil. (While I’m at it, it’s really interesting to see people’s reactions when I say that I’m living in Creil. “Creil?” they usually repeat, making sure I said what I said with an astonished look on their faces. “Oui,” I say. “Creil, you say?” “Oui,” je dis encore. “Oh,” they say. It’s almost like saying I’m from East LA. Haha ok, maybe not that drastic, but definitely a surprise for them.)

Yesterday, I spent the day biking from Abbeville to Saint-Valery-sur-Somme, a decent twelve kilometer ride one way. It wasn’t exactly what I had in mind. In fact, I had actually thought my French friend and I were going to go to see a chateau (castle), but halfway there upon expressing my excitement for the chateau by the water, I was sorely disappointed when he said that there was no castle.
“But I thought we were going to see a castle…”
“You said you wanted to see the beach!” he says in his wonderful French accent.
“I thought the castle was on the beach.”
“What? No…”
“Oh… ok…”
“It’s ok?” (I love when the French say this. They don't say, "Is it ok?" but "It's ok?" hehe)
“Yes, ok, I haven’t seen anything bigger than my river in a while.”
Thus, no castle on the beach. Les chateaux and Mont St. Michel must wait for another outing.

One 45-minute train ride later and we’re biking our way along a beautiful tree-lined river (which seemed way too straight to be a natural river; it must have been man made). One thing I love about France is how their trees are all in order, perfectly spaced and quite uniform. The down side to that is however that the scenery didn’t quite change. There were some scattered houses along the way, a few bridges here and there, but aside from that, the trees were several meters apart and the river ran north to Saint-Valery-sur-Somme.

After an hour and a half (ish) of biking along the countryside, my travel buddy and I finally see civilization in the shape of dozens of boats and we arrive in a beautiful town called Saint-Valery-sur-Somme. And goodness, am I happy! I haven’t ridden a bike for that long in ages! In fact, I’m not sure I have even ridden a bike for that long period! Anyhow, we lock up our bikes, and eat at a crêperie with a view of the water. After some yummy crêpes and delicious Earl Grey tea (yum yum!) we continue on to what is supposedly the place Jeanne d’Arc (Joan of Arc) was held prisoner before her unfortunate fate at the stake.

Clear skies, slight breeze, and wonderful scenery. What could be better! And a nice warm 9C (48F) too! (yes, to me that is warm right now. This time last year I would have been very bitter about it being 9C/48F.)

Et maintenant, des photographs!

Pictures from the view for the 24km (round trip) we biked.