May 1

May 1st is Labor Day in France and a national holiday. Since this year it was a Thursday a lot of people take off work on Friday to get a long weekend out of it. (Next weekend is even longer, Thursday and Monday are both off!) Since Mystery Guest's parents were out of town this weekend we invited some friends to come discover the region. Kristina and Charlie (another franco-american couple) were able to come for the day on Thursday but had to leave early Friday morning. Nonetheless we crammed a lot of great things into one day and the weather mostly cooperated!

In the morning there were some nasty black clouds that would send occasional showers our way but passed quickly with the wind. We decided to take our chances and have a picnic next to a little river where we had had a picnic last October for my birthday. We had a few showers but hey, how many people can say that they've had a picnic in the rain?? As we raised our goblets of wine to the passing cars people waved and laughed at us - it was great!

Then as we drove to the beach the skies cleared and we had a beautiful walk along the coast.

Kristina taking a close up picture of the flowers (which made us all laugh, it looked like she was a sniper trying to take out the Germans...)

Then we went into Cherbourg to go to the Chateau des Ravalet and then into downtown to grab a drink on the terrace. The town was pretty dead but there were some people selling muguets - lily of the valley - in the main square.

Then we took them down to a great little cookie store, like an old fashioned general store where everything is homemade and delish! And finally to Briquebec and a creperie for dinner!
It was a great day!! Not too busy, we had time to lay in the sun and enjoy a day off to play :-)

Of course in the evening we had to go for a game of Catan, two actually it was just too good!