Vacation (Part 3)

During vacation Dan took the oldest three out to see some dinosaur tracks.  Very near the place we stayed were some amazing Dinosaur Tracks.  This article gives much better info than I can.  From all accounts, it was a really cool.  It had just rained the night before, so the rain had collected in the footprints leaving them quite visible and easy to recognize.  I was told this was a really steep hill despite the photo making it look level.  Another solid hike by the boys!

 You can see here how the mud rippled out after impact

Our own little dinosaurs...

Another highlight of our trip was getting to meet and spend time with our neighbors, Jean-Charles & Valerie. They had three young daughters and became an invaluable resource to us as local guides.  They were helpful, kind, generous and a pleasure to be with.  

We ended up spending a couple evenings hanging out with them and their kids.  Thankfully they spoke English well.  (It's been a long time since I studied under Madame Wright...) However, it was so fun to hear our kids freely trying their hand at French.  By the end of the trip "bonjour", "merci" and "au revoir" came quite easily to their lips

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And just one word on French people.  Typically in the States, French people have a reputation as being snobby and mean.  We didn't experience this at all.  To the contrary, we found almost all the people we encountered to be kind and helpful.  I was happy to debunk that stereotype in my mind.

And on one of our last days, we took a little longer drive and went to see Les Grottes de Baume les Messiers. This was about a bit of a long drive, made even longer by the fact that I got us repeatedly lost... so much for my Amazing Race hopes.  Anyway, this was an expansive cave system that was really cool.  And by cool, I mean cold inside. William has been really into bats lately, so he was particularly excited.  After finally arriving there, we entered in with the group and saw the amazing stalagmites and stalactites, unfortunately the tour was in French, so we probably missed a lot of what was really cool.  

 Me and my boys!

After that, we went out to eat. We usually don't go out to eat with the kids.  If we do, it's usually a stressful, anxiety-ridden meal.  I usually worry about the kids disturbing other people's dinner and they typically don't like restaurant food so that turns into an issue.  Needless to say, it usually dissolves into exactly what it's not suppose to be.  This was an exception...  One of our hopes on vacation was to have an good French meal.  Since I mainly cooked dinner at the house we stayed at our food was most definitely not French (unless frozen FRENCH fries count!).  Our helpful neighbors, recommended this place, Le Regardoir.  They did not steer us wrong! 

They had a playground where the kids played while we waited for our food (which was amazing!).  The kids were thrilled.  They were even MORE thrilled when they realized that other kids playing there spoke English too.  These kids and ours played so great together and just had a blast!

The meal was fantastic and with the playground right there it practically felt like we were on a date. I wish I had a picture of everyone asleep in the car on the way home :)