Barefoot and Pregnant

Someone thought he'd be funny by getting proof that I was barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen cooking.

What do you think?

Hot Stuff

Whilst driving home one evening we received a text from Alan saying the car park near our flat was on fire. 

When we got home we found out that it took the fire-fighters 1 hour before getting there and there were several cars on fire by then. 

It was in the next car park to us and appeared to be an overheated car.  The hot weather and along with the wind helped to spread the fire to other cars. 

Picnic in the Pyrenees

It took us 2 hours to get to the town of Mont Louis which was another (albeit smaller) fortified town.  It was situated in the Pyrenees mountains. 

We had a picnic lunch on the bank of the fort’s outer defence before heading inside. 

It only took us 90 mins to see the entire place.  Unfortunately, the tourist office was closed so we didn’t know to get tickets to see the militarily section of the fort.  This was about half of the town's size.

This town actually had a little playground which clung to the side of the hill.  The boys were very excited and despite the equipment being in the hot sun refused to go any further until they partook.

At one point we walked past a restaurant where a group commented on the fact that we spoke English and were wearing American hats (due to the fact that we were wearing our accrubra hats). 
 

The fact that they concluded that we were Americans amused Michael no end and he was tempted to go up to them and tell them we were Ozzies.  

On our way out we spoke to a French lady (who didn't speak English) who enquired about the boys.  We ascertained that she was asking how old they were as she initially assumed that they were twins.  When we told her and that number 3 was on his way she was surprised. 

Much the same reaction as the English people has when I tell them. 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 

As we were in the area we decided to Font de Romeo (Roman Spa town) which was 15mins away.  This was a very small town with a tiny raised fort (about 5 metres across) just outside.  To get up to the top of this little fort we had to walk up around the outside in a spiral in a steep incline.  All the way to the top looked like little houses which had a life sized statue inside once. 

In one of these was a lizard about 4cm long; scampering up the side.  Zachary was well amused and wanted to check out each one to see if there was more.  In the end I had to tell him that the lizards were visiting their friends.
 
 

Before we headed home, Alan wanted a nice quiet drink in the local café which we obliged however, Zachary was bored and so this wasn’t as quiet as Alan would’ve liked.  This was despite me feeding Zachary an orange and bottled water in an attempt to distract him from misbehaving.

Carcassonne

We decided to go to a major tourist destination in the area - the town of Carcassonne (90min drive on motorways). This is a working town within a castle and to our surprise was free to enter (except for the large keep).

We drove our way to the base of the castle where there were 3 large car parks. However, we couldn’t find a car park that was empty as it was sooo busy, so we ended up in lower part of town which was also full.

We noticed a couple of cars parked illegally to one side of a small parking area, these were locals, and decided to park like them. We hoped that we wouldn’t get a ticket (thankfully we didn’t). 

Then we walked up the winding streets to castle keeping an eye out for a place to buy takeaway sandwiches. We couldn’t get any lunch as it was sooo busy in all the shops and most of the places were sit down restaurants (the boys were in no mood to wait around for us to eat).

At one point I tried to buy churros (long thin donuts) but I was not able to, the owner explained (via hand gestures) that new fat was just heating up. As we hadn't had lunch we ended up snacking on the apples, oranges and pancakes which I packed just in case.

We wondered around between the outer and inner defensive walls until it got too difficult with pram.  This area wasn’t paved; just filled with rubble and dirt.  There were fantastic views of the lower town and the fields. 

Then we went inside to the town.  If you didn’t know we were inside a fortified castle you would’ve just thought it was a small vibrant town situated on a hill.  There were all manner of shops, meeting areas, general public areas as well as a couple of hotels and churches.  It was quite amazing and in many ways it put the English castles to shame in that they are just large private residents used as safe areas in times of need. 

The keep looked quite impressive from the outside however it was jammed packed with people so we decided not to go in.  Later we discovered that we wouldn't have been allowed to anyway due to the thin and steep stairways.

We headed back to the car via the old bridge which was situated outside the castle walls and joined the outer town with the fortified castle and inner town.  It was considerably quieter here.

The drive home was very difficult as the wind was absolutely horrendous so Michael ended up with sore arms from trying to keep the car on the road.

On the motorways we saw four breakdowns. One which was particularly memorable was with a caravan wheel and axel on the motorway and the car with the caravan still attached sitting in the lay-by 500 metres down the road. They were very lucky to have got there as they would’ve been riding the remaining axel and edge of the caravan.

About 30mins from home Alex had a nappy failure so we had a pleasant smell for the rest of the trip. When we stopped we had to take the covers off the seat to wash them by hand to ensure that they didn’t stain. This little accident also meant that it was straight to bath for the boys as Alex was leaking everywhere.

Halal Pork?

If memory serves me correctly the people that eat halal meat aren't allowed to eat pork. 

So this must be wrong.  

St Cyprien Flat

 
 
Upon reading the below it sounds as if the flat was awful but it was designed for older children and adults making it perfect for most holiday makers.  As we had babies it was a bit more challenging.

 
 
 
The flat was situated about 5 mins walk from the main drag and 10 mins which was fantastic as it was close but not to close to the noise so the boys could sleep without being disturbed. 

It had tiled floors which meant that it was easy to clean (something which was good when the boys decided to decorate them with their dinner).

 
 
The flat was littered with personalised items and easily breakable knick knacks.  This meant that there wasn’t space for our gear.  I ended up removing everything below 2ft and putting it the cupboards above so that nothing would get broken. 

 
 
Despite this the TV, fans and a few other major items were within Alex’s reach and were magnets for him.  This wouldn’t bode well for the rest of the holiday as all you could hear us saying was ‘Don’t touch that' , 'Get away from that', or 'Get down from there.’

The wall for the balcony had a single large panelled sliding door which was ideal for the boys to bang items on which they did. 

The bathroom, bedrooms and kitchen had a door shaped window which just had railings (similar to the balcony ones) which were ideal for the boys to throw things off with the potential of hitting passers-by (Zachary did throw several items off but no one got hurt) or get stuck in. 
 

They thankfully had roll down security shutters however, this made the place extremely hot as there was no ventilation when they were down.

Summer BBQs

It's summer so being an Ozzie, I demanded BBQs.

I must mention at this point that it is the wettest summer on record.

Our family BBQ went ahead despite the downpour due to a little ingenuity.