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| Céret - the trees in the town make it look quite hidden |
Today we said farewell to Laroque and headed into Céret for the last time on this trip. We called in to the real estate agent’s, collected the key, a final look around our apartment and measure up of a few dimensions we had forgotten, and then left a box in one of the cupboards ready for next year. It included books we had read and didn’t want to have to heave back to NZ, plus our down sleeveless vests which will be good to have in Céret and which we can replace with better ones in NZ. We will have to buy new clothes for Céret but no doubt will bring out some when we come next time. I already have a number of warm jackets and work clothes put away in Bella’s wardrobe at home, on the basis we may need them for just this reason.
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| IKEA |
We headed off north to Montpellier at about 11am. We had two reasons for stopping here on our way to Italy. One was that it has a huge IKEA store and the other that our couch-surfers from last year, Astrid and Sebastien, now live there and had invited us to stay with them. They are a lovely young French couple (30ish) and it was great to catch up with them. Sebastian’s parents happened to be staying with at the time. They live in Paris and are currently looking for a place in the area to retire to. Astrid and Sebastien kindly gave us their bed, while they slept on a fold-out couch.
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| Astrid, Seb & his parents |
His parents had spent up large at the supermarket and put on a fabulous French meal for us. We wined and dined outside and didn’t get to bed until nearly midnight. His parents spoke virtually no English but John was getting pretty fluent by this stage and could understand most of what was being said, could reply in French, with Seb doing a bit of translating along the way. It was a very pleasant evening. His mother thanked us for looking after “the children” while they were in NZ
J. We would love to keep in contact with all of them, and have offered them the apartment in Céret when it is done up. J & I are also invited to Seb’s parents place wherever they may retire. They so much went out of their way to make us feel welcome. Mrs “Seb” even washed the windscreen of our car which got covered in squashed cherries which had fallen from the tree we had parked under!
