Normandy (part 2): Escargot, the Bayeaux Tapestry, and more

When I last left this story, we'd just visited Omaha Beach and the Normandy American Cemetery. These two amazing visits took us pretty much all day, so with hearts full and empty stomachs, we started heading back to our little farm house. 

On our way back, Fran and Devon spotted a sign at a restaurant for Crepes. We stopped, of course. I mean, we were in France. 

While looking over the list of crepes available, Berkley also saw something he wanted everyone to try: Escargot. 

I accepted the challenge. 

Out came the food. 

Here's how Bridger felt about his Nutella crepe:

Here's how Bridger felt about the Escargot:

(I laugh EVERY TIME I look at this)

As for me:

I came. 

I consumed. 

I conquered. 

It was...soily. 

I mean, if you can get past the undeniably soily aftertaste, and the fact that you are using a fork specifically designed to remove SNAILS from their SHELLS and then put them into your mouth, the buttery garlic sauce they use to try to cover it all up wasn't that bad. 
Sorry all you escargot lovers out there...

We stopped at the grocery store. I was reminded how very much I don't speak French. It took me about 15 minutes to figure out how to weigh the stupid carrots. But we did it! I also saw giant vacuum-packed, frozen bags of escargot in the freezer area. It's no joke.

Back at the farm house we threw some frozen pizzas into an oven we had NO idea how to work. The first one turned out to be what Berkley and I like to call "Cajun". I wish I could say we learned our lesson, but that was not the last thing we burnt in that oven...

After putting our tired, wiggley kids to bed, we enjoyed some good Fran and Devon time. Did I already mention how awesome they are? Then hit the hay ourselves. 

Sunday morning we took things slow. The weather outside was misty and wet.  We ate a good, slow breakfast, let the kids play, fed the chickens, explored a bi, getting all the shoes involved completely soaked, and watched General Conference. After getting a bit stir-crazy we did venture out for a drive in the afternoon to the surrounding small towns. Fran and Devon spotted a small play yard behind an old church and we stopped to let the kids play there for a while. Across the fence was a horse we threw apples to - only to realize he had an entire apple tree of his own on his side of the fence. Ha! 

After a homemade meal of Indian food (Coconut Korma, anyone? soooo good) we once again sent the kids to bed to make room for more Fran and Devon time. Scattegories. It turns out that if you put a slight amount of pressure on me, I can't think of one single solitary "thing that you wear" that starts with the letter "R". 
I did not win. 

Monday we were up for a real adventure again. After much deliberation, we settled on Bayeux. 

Bayeaux? Never heard of it?

Neither had I. But guess who HAD: 
Berkley. And he was nerding out about going there to see the "Bayeaux Tapestry". He'd been talking about it since the idea of going to Normandy even came about. 
The rest of us were like "um...cool?" but because he was so excited, we decided to hit it up.
Guess what:
The Bayeaux Tapestry did NOT disappoint.  
It turned out to be AWESOME. 

One small stretch of the incredibly long tapestry. Note: this is
a photo I took of a postcard we bought (see details below)

 Not only is the Bayeaux Tapestry almost 1,000 YEARS OLD, it is also 70 METERS LONG and tells the story of William the Conqueror, which happens to be pretty epic. IT WAS SO COOL. They gave you a headset where the tapestry started, and as you walked along it, it told you the whole story and what was happening in the pictures embroidered on each panel. Think epic children's book that someone reads to you while you look at the pictures, except instead of it being pictures printed on pages it's super-detailed pictures embroidered on cloth that is literally 1,000 years old. 
And somehow it has survived. All this time.
YEAH. It was cool. 

Close-up of some of the embroidery. Again, photo of a
postcard that I bought. 

Did I mention it was super-detailed? 
Seriously. It was amazing. 

I was admittedly wrong about Berkley's over-exuberance to see this thing, and thoroughly enjoyed nerding-out about it myself.  

Walking toward the Cathedral
in Bayeaux

Also, Bayeux was a really cool town. It had a gorgeous cathedral and, of course, an amazing French bakery, complete with GIANT eclairs that we decided were heavy enough they could have been used in William the Conqueror's battle to render people unconscious. 

After Bayeux, we headed to Caen, which we struggled to pronounce out loud all day. We parked next to a giant castle, we did some shopping, listed to a street musician play "Hotel California" just for us dumb Americans, and rode a carousel. It was fun :) 

We stayed up way too late on Monday night trying to soak in the last of our kid-free time with Devon and Fran. We woke up the next day, packed up, fed the chickens one last time, wrangled all of the kids together for one last group photo, and then drove 8 hours home. THAT was definitely part of the adventure. The kids are turning into quite the road warriors :) 

Feeding the chickens, checking for eggs.
Violet, after finding 5 eggs: "This is the best day of my life." 

Group photo! You should have seen the other ones...

A few more photos are included below, as always, for memory's sake. And let me just say this one more time: Devon and Fran and their kids are the best. Yeah for successful adventures!

Fran and Violet

The whole crew on the move

Enjoying our massive, delicious eclairs

Carousel in Caen!

Remember how I took photos of the postcards? Well, photos
Weren't allowed, for obvious reasons. Here's a photo of the back
of one of the post cards, in case you're curious about the
copyright jibberjabber and who took the original photo :)