Thursday, November 20, 2014

Random Celebrations & The Forest

Today was the celebration of Les Beaujolais Nouveau 2014. What in the world is that?! If I understand correctly, it's the celebration of the first wine produced in 2014 from the Beaujolais region; and the third Thursday of November is the national "reveal" party for the wine. The first batch of wine is not supposed to be very good, but it's become a tradition to celebrate, and so we did. Our chef prepared a wonderful raclette lunch (think fondue with individual pots-yay!)  He served the raclette cheese with a variety of items: baked potatoes, eggs (which you cooked in your little raclette dish), grilled onions and mushrooms, various meats and of course baguettes, accompanied by the Beaujolais wine - which to my unrefined taste was quite good!

 
 
After lunch I finally got to go for a walk in the Rambouillet Forest, which is a large National Forest that surrounds most of the city. It is one of the things that appealed to me about moving here, and it is great! It's very flat, but wooded, and there's a little pond with some camp sites and several yurts (but they've been dismantled for the winter).

My first glimpse of the forest

The pond is a man-made reservoir which was created to collect water to supply the fountains in Versailles

I'm eager to learn about the trees and plants here - anybody know what those super tall trees in the background are?



The damn
 
Leaving the forest for today
 

 

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