Fromagerie pt. 1

In June I worked at a farm in Fougeré, just outside of Angers. The farm was mostly a fromagerie which meant there was fresh goat cheese in the fridge every day. And it was soooo good.

The farm was also a sort of horse ranch. Families from Paris would come down on Sundays and go for balades and then canoe rides on Le Loir. Not to be confused with La Loire, this river was really quiet and there were old French men fishing on the riverbank. At one point we stopped in the backyard of the chateau and went swimming in our undies. My canoe mates were a little girl and her Portuguese father, who has lived in Paris for the past 15 years, but before that, lived in Winnipeg for 20 years on SHERBROOK. How crazy is that?!!!

Regular site in my room. Add buzzing flies, a candlelit bathroom and the smell of goat and you've got the general idea.

Some of the best food I've ever eaten, alongside cavaliers, canoers and many bottles of  Coteaux de  Loire.

Most of my time was spend tending to this sandy soil. 

Chèvre!

Guardian of the gate. This loner coq could be found sitting here every time I open & shut the gate.

Next door (across the fields and through the woods) there was another WWOOF team building a house. Here's the inside of the bus the family slept in.

Ma voisine, 'tit chou Lilou

Gamine, crazy beauty. My French roomie Manuela looked after the horses. We used to go galloping in the forest and sometimes end up on the path up to the chateau. Kind of like a fairytale.

If anyone is wondering, I used HelpX to find the farm. It's an awesome site and has a variety of organic farms and homestays. There were about 530 hosts in France alone, much more than I found on WWOOF France. 

Nieces & nephews

My nephew turned 3 today. It's really beautiful in Winnipeg lately so I biked down to my sister's with my camera for the birthday party. It was a great chance to take some shots of my little nieces and nephews that are growing up so fast. Oughta put a brick on their head!

I can always count on amazing GF food from my sister

There was a Transformers pinata, of course

Fighting over candy...

l'Étang

Behind my student residence there was a beautiful pond, l'Étang Saint Nicolas. A couple weeks ago we found out that a serial rapist used to hang out there. That would have been useful information for when we wandered through the fields in the dark on our way to bonfires. Here are some shots from different seasons.

Artaq Festival Angers

So it's been a long time since July 1st. When I ended up back in Winnipeg this summer I wasn't sure I'd continue this project. But tonight I've decided to keep posting, even though my year abroad was cut short. I'll be traveling and back in Europe soon enough.

I guess I'll start where I left off, with some more photos and stories from France. These are from the 2nd annual Artaq Awards that took place in Angers this May. One Saturday before work I was walking around town and came across all this paper at the Place du Ralliement.

I did a little drawing and Yoh, a Japanese artist participating in the festival, came up and we chatted. I also met Ruben Grande, the photographer of a lot of these photos. Later on I checked out Yoh's show and some of the live painting that was happening around the city.

Some of Yoh's pieces

That evening I met back up with Yoh, Ruben and a few other artists, from all over - France, Belgium, LA, Italy, etc. One of the events was to paint on the windows of Galeries Lafayette, a French department store of the main square. Yoh invited me to join and Ruben was nice enough to take some cool shots. I drew some Matryoshka dolls for my friend Emma. It was tricky hanging onto the window sill, especially in my little dress!

Afterwards we headed to Hotel Bar du Centre with the other artists and stayed there till we got kicked out. Next we went to an exclusive discothèque I'd never seen or heard of. When we arrived the door was barred and locked and I thought we were out of luck. But someone rang the bell and a middle-aged man opened the door to a noisy, small room and filed us in. It was the weirdest bar I've been to, with big tropical plants, a huge TV playing 80s Spanish music videos, and drinks that started at 20 euro. You could smoke inside and the DJ was playing Blondie.

A few too many drinks at Hotel Bar du Centre

Definitely a memorable night.

Yoh's website
Ruben's website

Une Belle-Beille histoire

This weekend I moved out of my student dorm. I couldn't imagine the amount of stuff I'd accumulated.  After a lot of sorting I packed it all into 2 bags and 1 portfolio. It's a weird sight, having your entire life neatly packed and sitting by your door. Everyone has said their goodbyes to Cité Universitare de Belle-Beille and Lakanal and how it's my turn. I can't say I'll miss the crappy bus service or the weirdos that hang out at the corner by le Tabac du Lac. What I will miss is cooking with friends every night, bonfires by the pond and cramming 20 people into nine square meters. Here are some photos from some of my time spent at Belle-Beille.

Honey. 

Emma and José Maria - these two are great together

A shot of my room in February with huge hands!

Campfires in the bushes.  Ah-wimb-a-way, ah-wimb-a-way....

The agriculture campus had parties every second thursday and Erasmus students crashed just about everyone. 

Cheap sangria & dancing on the bar

Paddy playing guitar on St. Patricks day

Big dinners in our communal kitchens 

Having a picnic outside our residence between classes. Sometimes we didn't make it back to class.

A beautiful surprise Claire left at my doorstep one night.

Sitting around after Sunday brunch

For Jill's birthday we all got dressed up and went to dinner. Rachel did all of our make-up, what a star!

Shane gave me this mirror when he left, such a treat for a couple weeks. The flowers on the left were picked from a construction site. There are wild poppies everywhere.