This last Sunday, a perfect sunny day, I noticed a huge class of tiny sail boats head out into the water. They were gone for hours-they must have had lunch on board at some point. I would loved to have had a class like this when I was young. Anyway, some photos from that day.

Taken from our terrace when they first headed out.

Hours later, when they returned, I walked down to the shore to get a look. It was bedlam. As soon as their boats hit the shore, they madly dashed up to carts with wheels to move the boats out of the water so the next batch could do the same.

Getting the boat on the carrier.

Trying to show how many there were.

The last group making their way to shore.

In the meantime, there was this couple with their little dog, oblivious to it all. The kids had to pull their boats around them to get them to their destination

This is a look at the beach in the middle of the day full of people and then afterwards as the sun was setting. I took this video a couple of weeks ago and each day there are more and more people on the beach and I think in a month or so, it will be packed and I will get another video. When the sun is out, so are beach lovers.

Since it is so flat around here, we bought some bikes to explore the area in either direction from our new place on the beach-Provence was a different story and I never rode a bike there.
We went way past where I usually manage to run and found some really nice homes reminding me of California beach towns, a little nature reserve with a path running through it and different views of the ocean than what we usually see. (I think we have the nicest view with a stretch of beach in front of the water). It was a cold day after a recent very warm day-spring is such a fickle season-but there was sun so we bundled up and headed out.

I’m particularly taken by these little shacks for fishing at the end of long, private piers. I’ve only seen them once before and love to photograph them. They are called Carrettes.

A closeup on one. Can you see that net suspended above the water? It is lowered into the water and then fish are pulled up, usually small ones.

A look down the coast.

Another look at a net.

You can see how long the pier is.

Something different. I love finding irises blooming.

Maurice and I went to a movie in La Rochelle, just a short ten minutes away from our place, at 6 PM-we love our location. When we came out the light was just wonderful poking through some dark clouds.

I love the light house and the tree right there in the middle of La Rochelle by the harbor.

Love the light and the reflection in the harbor.

The second light house near the harbor to guide boats inbetween the two towers guarding the harbor.

Maurice and I had a drink before heading home.

Where we had our drink. Great exterior.

Home to an incredible sunset.

There is a very good TV show here in France called Les Racines et Les Ailes about various areas in France. It gives as in depth look at either a monument such as, Notre Dame, a city such as, Paris, or an area which just happened to be about Poitou Charente this week where we have our new place so I was excited to see this to learn more about this part of France. One of the things I saw was the last remaining transporting bridge in France which was only about 25 minutes away. It was built by a Frenchman in the early 1900′s and, instead of having a bridge which spanned high above a river so boats could pass, it moved the bridge from one side of the river to the other. I wish I had a better lens to show how this works, but here is the video I took showing it:

The beach where our place is has a view of the ocean and there is constant activity, either on sunny days with people playing on the sand and sail boat lessons going on or very windy days when the kite surfers arrive so they can speed along on the water. There are surf boarders too.

Here are some kite surfers arriving, carrying their kites behind them looking like a group of butterflies.

Another view. See how far away they are? The tide here goes way out a really long distance which is good for growing oysters but, if you don’t arrive when the tide is high, a long walk is required to get to the water. I’ve noticed that when there is a sailing lesson going on, the boats always arrive back at shore exactly as the tide is going to turn so they are on the beach to be picked up, not out where they can’t be reached until the tide comes in again. Places without such high and low tides must have a must easier time of it. Learning about life here.

On the day before we left Northern Ireland, we made a trip into Londonderry. It was the scene of some violence with IRA bombings and there continue to be marches all of the time. We were even told by a waiter that we shouldn’t go as it was the day of Margaret Thatcher’s funeral and there were some negative feelings towards her in Northern Ireland. I don’t understand all of the politics of it other than some people want independence from England. There also seems to be some unpleasant things going on between the Catholics and Protestants. We weren’t up for a long walk in the city so we decided to take a tour by taxi. Our driver turned out to be a member of the IRA and told us all sorts of things about all that had gone on during the violent time including he and his brother getting shot at with rubber bullets by the English soldiers. He even pulled one out and showed us-it was much larger than I thought it would be. He seemed to think that the peace brokered by President Clinton some years back would probably hold but was fairly negative about the climate in Northern Ireland. I wondered if we had gotten another driver, if we would have heard the English side of the story. Looking back on it, Londonderry had a rather sad air and a feeling of not thriving although there was a mall that we saw, full of people.

One of the graves of 14 killed during “Bloody Sunday”. I thought the shot through a raining taxi window sort of fitting.

A U.S. flag from 1945 in the church there, St. Columb’s. Note there are only 48 stars. The volunteer there, when hearing I was from Texas, said, “You’ll like that flag in there then. Alaska isn’t represented, thus Texas is still the biggest state.”

I love the Irish accent. I did a video of our waiter just to record his voice. We had been in Londonderry the day before-a city once full of conflict and bombings and which still seems to be recovering-and I asked him his opinion mainly to get him talking.

On the way to the Giant’s Causeway, a popular place on the shore in Northern Ireland we stopped at Carrick-a-Rede, which was a bridge once used by salmon fishermen to reach a spawning ground-the salmon are now sadly gone. It started pouring and the wind was blowing but I trudged up a hill over a kilometer each way and crossed it just to say I did.

A look at the bridge from up above.

Another view-you can see people crossing it.

The Giant’s Causeway is a fascinating place on the sea where volcanic lava did interesting things to the existing rocks leaving behind these stones and columns looking like tile. Or, you can go with the story that a giant with the great name of Finn Mc’Cool did it.

Another view.

A column of the rocks. I read that there are similar stone formations in Scotland.