Collioure to Castelnaudary

Since we weren’t in a big rush to pick up our boat in Castelnaudary we decided to make a stop at a mall to pick up some warmer clothes and some provisions for the week. We had success on all front, but the most amazing thing was the food court! The chef at the food court was spotless, walking proud, even taking a picture of his couscous station which was piled high with an artful arrangement of eggplant, red peppers and bottles of white wine. It was fun (and yummy) to see the pride that the French took in their food. With our little necessary shopping diversion we were able to make it just in time to Castelnaudary to check in and get our boat. After the slowest orientation of all time we were able to get our stuff piled high in the galley and Sven was able to take off to Toulouse (an hour away) where we were supposed to return our Renault lease of 4 weeks. It was a little strange to say goodbye as we were told that because of the strike only one train had run that day. But nonetheless, he set off while the girls and I unpacked our piles of disorganized junk, stowed groceries and did general boat stuff. We were all kind of sad because we knew that the strike would get in the way of meeting our Kodiak friends Zoya & Patrick with their kids Stuey and Nora and our other friend (and mommy helper) Hannah (now living in Germany) so we were kind of sad. By 4 we were on the boat, by 5 however Eilidh disappeared onto the deck for some reason and came back excited and panting. She’d seen Zoya! Bella and Eilidh ran screaming and cackling out the door towards their friends, giving them huge hugs and smiles. By 6 we’d had a snack and decided we’d better take a walk around the town and by 8 we were back on the boat and getting kids ready for bed. By 9 Sven still wasn’t home and I was resigned to the fact that he was sleeping in a train station, but by 9:30 he was home and we finally knew that, somehow, amongst this crazy train strike, we had all made it and were ready to go!
The boat: amazing! 4 bedrooms, two bathrooms, big comfy galley, a front ‘deck’ , nice big top deck with a table, 4 bikes, hurrah!
The canal: In the late 1660s Pierre Paul Riquet, a salt tax collector, became interested in the idea of linking the Mediterranean to the Atlantic ocean and started doing research, eventually convincing investors to work with him and primarily financing the canal himself. After seeing the canal we realize that it was no small project, as to link such massive river valleys as you have in this area (not to mention two major oceans) one has to make a lot of adjustments for altitude. In the 157 Kilometer section of canal that we are cruising (which is just a small portion of the huge canal!) there are 61 locks! Not to mention bridges going over the canal with just a few inches to spare, a large walking/ biking trail next to the canal which was originally for the horses to draw the boats along the canal, and the sheer amount of rock work and cement work to piece this feet of engineering together! This video is shot by Patrick...

Leaving Collioure

Our last couple days were bittersweet… sweet because of the wonderful time we were having with our friends, bitter because we knew it was drawing to a close, and that Alaska is too far from California… also sweet because of the amazing meals that we had together, but bitter because we were starting to feel like gluttons.

Thursday we woke up feeling happy to be in such a lovely, relaxing home… drank a lot of coffee and let the kids play while we slowly thought about our day. So far we had not been terribly impressed with the towns around Collioure, but thought we’d give it another try. We’d heard a lot about the towns of the Costa Brava in Northern Spain but couldn’t really find out much information that excited us, so we decided to just drive along the coastal route and check out the first town we saw over the border. We made it a lunch-time expedition. The drive was beautiful, all curvy roads and grape fields on the cliffs, with an occasional wine stand on a bluff. After about 30 minutes of driving we crossed the border into Spain (very anti-climactic) and descended down a steep hill into Port Bou, oddly quiet yet with a stunning view of the sea. The kids played in a park for a while and Vicky and I scoped out the food options (tapas, paella, sangria…. What we came to Spain for!). One of the waiters asked us if we were on holiday in Spain, and we told him that it was in fact France and he laughed saying that we had to come to Spain because France was closed (because of the strikes). Pretty much. A lovely meal of paella and seafood and Catalonian flan left us feeling bloated and happy so we headed home to contemplate our next meal. After a walk around Collioure and a stop at a park we were treated to a wonderful pasta meal by Vicky after which Sven had the brilliant idea to take everyone out for ice cream. Getting 4 kids in the car after dark (even if it is for ice cream) when they are tired and grumpy is definitely not the easiest task. And when the night is concluded with weepy Téa losing her favorite teddy bear somewhere in Collioure and all of us rushing around to find it, we are all bonded in the insanity of travels with kids. And when the faithful daddy finds the teddy bear we are all elated and can finally go to sleep. One of my favorite memories? Seeing Bella’s gigantic eyeballs as she is served ice cream in an orange piled high with whipped cream.

Friday we decided yet again that we needed to spend even more time not doing anything stressful, so we decided that a simple trip to the market the next town over was in order. 20 minutes of driving brought us to Perpignan, which is actually quite a big city and to what we thought was a traditional market, but ended up being a local Arabic low-income flea market, complete with batteries, bras, fruit and just about anything else you could imagine. On the way back home after we’d given up on that market we decided to swing by the traditional Catalonian craft center, which ended up being all boarded up and empty so we finally figured that fate had conspired against us to force us to just relax and we headed home. Along the way we were surprised to see a captivating strike (‘le grieve’) outside a high school: rubbish piled high up against the main school gate, students sitting, smoking, around a metal garbage can spewing flames and black smoke into the air. Apparently much of the trouble in France currently with the strikes is with the youth. Their teachers on strike leaves them without anything to do so they head out to, for example, flip cars and throw bottles at police. We haven’t seen much of the strike this time around, but this visual image will definitely stick with me, as the thought of this sort of thing happening in Kodiak is so far-fetched… striking teachers in Kodiak would lead to bonfires and sledding and probably a lot of TV watching.

Realizing that we were being by outside forced to relax, we headed back to Collioure to sit in the sun on the beach. Which is what we did for the next couple of hours. Téa and Bella built a great wall of China out of rocks, we all laid out on the beach and closed our eyes, and Téa ordered us all drinks with her lovely French (even at 6 it is much better than mine). A farewell meal of Sven’s always delicious steaks, another little girl bath bonanze and some major packing and we were done with out lovely week. Once the kids were out none of the adults wanted to go to bed as it felt so good to just sit around and visit…

Around Collioure

Tuesday- After the late night in Barcelona we decided to stay out of the car and explore a little more of the town. Not actually making out of the house until noon, we stopped for a take-out lunch of sandwiches and paninis and ate on the beach in the sun. Afterwards we all filled up on crepes then succumbed to the temptation of the tourist train, which seemed easy and kid-friendly, albeit a little bit mortifying. It turned out to be a nice little trip up to the hill-top forts (alternately occupied by the French and the Spanish) and through the neighboring town. Along the way we saw a park (hurrah!) and marveled at the terraced grape fields covering every side of the hills (wine here is spendy since it is all harvested via manual labor). Mostly we shushed the kids and enjoyed the down time. By 8 it was evident that the kids needed to immediately go to sleep, so we put them to sleep and were able to stay up and visit for a few wonderful relaxing hours.

Our buddy the praying mantis.

Climbing on the camera to check it out.

Making spears to show daddy.

A butterfly landed on me! He thought I was a flower!

A bunch of crepes, s'il vous plait...

Extensive grape terracing.

Wednesday- market day again! And a successful one since we found Ratatouille socks for Eilidh and Hello Kitty socks for Bella. And goat brie with figs for the rest of us. A surreal end of the market trip was the time on the beach watching the French marines do an obstacle course (complete with guns) in the bay. A yummy end to the morning was the rotisserie chicken from the market and grease-smothered potatoes, along with a cold bottle of chardonnay, outside on the patio. Afterwards we figured that we should go do something cultural so again we packed up the kids and took them to the uninspiring town of Ceret to see the modern art museum that has a fair number of Matisse and Picasso pieces. It was actually a lovely stop, as we were able to get the kids interested in sketching some Chagall chickens and cows while Sven and I admired Picasso’s unique pottery, including a set of bowls that featured different scenes from a bull fight. Not feeling too impressed by the town or the area, we headed home for dinner and some more downtime, which is just fine with us!

Just another day of commando training in paradise.