Wednesday, March 1, 2023

Living in the Rainbow State

 

Looking north from our lanai. 


Peace my friends!


Monday, January 23, 2023

Not A Big Surprise, Is it?

We flew back to Hawaii this month and are back to our favorite place, Kauna'oa beach. What can I say?

Moonset.

Monty is digging it too.

Peace my friends.


Thursday, September 1, 2022

The Pyrenees, Cauterets and the Spanish Bridge

 The wonder of Lourdes faded away as we took the bus up into the Pyrenees to Cauterets, a spa and ski town. Beautiful views and not too many people as it was between seasons. Lots of trails and waterfalls around the town.



Monty checking out another bear.






From Cauterets we took a gondola and then this ski chair to the top of Col du Lys.







We hiked down from Col du Lys to Gaube Lake:






We also went to the Spanish Bridge, a point that used to connect France and Spain. It was used by merchants on both sides as a place sell and exchange goods. It meets at the confluence of the Gave de Marcadau and the Gave de Gaube:





Peace my friends!



Wednesday, August 31, 2022

Praise the Lourdes

We stopped briefly in Lourdes on our way to Cauterets. Because we had to as the train stopped there for a few hours. It was everything we feared, but luckily for us, the hordes had gone home for the season.

Reminded me of Disneyland for some reason. Usually there are about a gazillion people about. Not today! 

Apparently, in 1860ish, soon-to-be Saint Bernadette had apparitions of the Virgin Mary by a grotto. She also dug in the ground and water came up. All you see here (and indeed the city), was built on and around the grotto. The waters, it is believed, cure the sick. I myself rubbed the water they had available from a spigot on my face to see if I could be cured of my neuralgia. Alas, it was not to be!

Lourdes is the fourth most popular pilgrimage in the world (an estimated 200+ million since 1860). 

Inside the Basillica.

Bernadette the Musical if you are so inclined.


The Ousse River. Not the source of the miracle waters, but still cool. 

Fun Fact: The Apparthotel on the right is one of many hotels in Lourdes that make the city the second largest in France (after Paris) by number of hotel rooms. (Not hotels themselves though: Nice is 2nd and Lourdes is 3rd.)

The next four pictures illustrate the real reason for coming to Lourdes: souvenirs! St. Patrick's shop is first because I am biased that way.






My lovely bride on the bridge over the Ousse.


Pax my friends!






Tuesday, August 16, 2022

FFS

 


That's 113 to you scientific Philistines. 

Peace

Tuesday, August 9, 2022

My Quest for a Carte De SĂ©jour

I need a carte de séjour (residence permit) to stay in France for more than 90 days. So off to the prefecture we went. I had read many horror stories about the experiences of others at different prefectures and was not expecting too much from this first meeting.

It started off on the wrong foot when the clerk said I had no right to live in France if my wife didn't work. Au contraire said the misses! She said she was "inactif" (the not working, but allowed to stay if one has the resources category), and that we had the resources to provide for us both.

He said he was like the police and she couldn’t argue with him and that she had to adjust her attitude! She held her ground and showed him our resources and the email from the French government indicating that the entire family's resources were to be considered and not just the resources of the EU citizen sponsoring the spouse. He decided to process the paperwork and then went back to talk to someone. He came back and his attitude was much better😀. I was very lucky that my lovely bride speaks French!

Then he said we needed to translate one of the financial documents (because not everyone speaks English!) and I had to write an attestation as to why I wanted to move to France. I got my receipt showing I had filed the paperwork. The clerk said to turn in the translation and attestation, and that it would take about 2 months. Au revoir, merci beaucoup!

6 weeks later I picked up my 5 yr carte de séjour. Better than expected!!

We then walked over to the CPAM (French health care) office and my wife was told that I could get health insurance, but that she, because she was not working, could not. This is not true, so the saga continues... 

Peace my friends!

Saturday, July 23, 2022

The Congélateur

The apartment we are renting in Toulouse did not have freezer section in the fridge. Our landlord, Vincent, said he would spring for a new freezer (a congĂ©lateur in French), so of course we said yes. We live on the fourth floor, which in France is four floors above the ground floor and the elevator can barely hold two people standing very, very close, spooning if you will. It sometimes takes us a few dance moves in the elevator to get it to go up if we are carrying groceries. Slide to the left, slide to the right, do the hokie pokie and voilĂ , it starts!

But I digress. Vincent ordered it and gave explicit instructions that the congĂ©lateur (I love this word), was to be delivered up to our apartment, and not to use the elevator as it was too small.

The delivery guys showed up as I was walking back from the market. Kirsty was having a chat with the guy who had set the congĂ©lateur on the ground outside of the entrance to the apartments. This was a far as he was going to move it as it was not his job to carry it up the stairs, or even into the apartment complex. Delivery to the outside door was his motto. 

She told him to sling his hook and take the congĂ©lateur back if he wasn’t going deliver it upstairs to our front door. So off they went and we told Vincent what had happened and he was a bit put off by these guys as he had paid extra to get the thing hauled up to our apartment. He called the store and chewed some butt and a new delivery date was set.

A few days later the new delivery guys showed up and brought it inside the lobby and stuck it in the elevator (by itself), pushed the button for the fourth floor and closed the door. The elevator stayed put and would not go up. One of the guys tried to open the door but it was locked closed.  Nothing we could do would open the door. Nor could we call the elevator up to our floor. It was stuck, unusable on the ground floor.

Your man called a phone number on the elevator and talked with somebody who said he would send someone around to sort out the problem. The delivery guys said they had deliveries to make so, au revoir and good luck. 

We went back to our apartment and waited for the elevator guy to call. He wasn’t too long and before you knew it, we were standing there before the open elevator door looking at a congĂ©lateur that was too big for the elevator. I pulled it out and the elevator guy gave a few hand signals to maybe take it out of the box and see if it would then fit. After a bit of pushing and shoving, I got it in the elevator and he made sure the door would close. Up it went, and Kirsty and I carted it the rest of the way into our apartment. Easy peasy. By the way, our congĂ©lateur model name is California. True story.

Peace my friends!