A Birthday, Bike Riding and Bugs

September 11th

💕 Happy Birthday, Elsa

Happy Birthday to our Elsa who turned 9 years old today! We wish we could have been there to celebrate with her. The hard part about being away is missing some of those special moments. Happily we were able to FaceTime with her before she left for school which made our day!

For us today was a bike ride to one of our favorite small cities in France, Dole. Dole was formerly the capital of the county of Burgundy and there are little canals that run through it with flowered covered bridges.  We did the usual 40 km and stopped in Dole to have our lunch with a view of the Notre-Dame Collegiate Church. This church was built in the 16th century and has a 73 meters high bell tower and an organ with 3500 pipes.  We have never taken the time to go inside but after reading about it I think it's time to put it on the must see list. The scenes along the Canal and the Doubs River are exceptional with flowers, barges, amazing buildings and topography.  We never seem to tire of our canal rides.

The Restaurant Garum was recommended so we decided to give it a try.  As with all restaurants here in Beaune one must make a reservation or risk being turned away.  It was a warm evening so we had our warm weather clothing on...a skirt for me and shorts for Jay.  What we didn't realize was that the "no-see-ums" bugs would be out in force.  And unfortunately we forgot to use our bug spray before leaving for dinner.  This really was the first time we've had a problem with the little critters so we were sorely unprepared.  The nice host seated us at a lovely garden table and we would have enjoyed our delicious meal a lot more if were weren't rushing to get out of the garden to get back to the apartment and grab our benedryl cream. Lesson learned...I hope!

A lovely salad starter

My trout main course

Jay's Pork Belly