le lundi 11 septembre 2017 – Monday September 11, 2017

It was not raining when Sandy shopped for our breakfast. The forecast today was for very strong wind this afternoon and tonight. Possibly over 40 mph. That is strong enough  to cause interruptions in power or along roads that are next to the ocean. The weather channel had issued warnings due to the wind. Usually, we don’t hear much wind since our building is made of granite. We shopped at Intermarché grocery store, arriving one hour later than in the past. There were a few people in line to check out in the two open lanes. There were almost no other people shopping. When we were ready to check out, we waited for 2 minutes. We caught the bus and were home almost immediately. There was a really strong wind blowing. We will not walk out on the mole / breakwater today.

An apartment in the building next to us has been under remodeling. One of the worker truck drivers forced the parking pole out of the concrete in front of our apartment building so he could park there. It took forever last year to get it replaced after the street was re-blacktopped. How inconsiderate of the worker to remove it.

The big news for today; it was cool enough for Phil to wear trousers instead of shorts! Fall must have arrived.

le mardi 12 septembre 2017 – Tuesday September 12, 2017

This was a day for strikes in France. Some businesses and bus lines were affected. <La Fournee Malouine Boulangerie> was closed today. Sandy told the lady yesterday she’d see her in the morning and the madame said that’s right. However, today there was a sign on the door saying closed on Tuesday. We had croissants from the <Cathedral Boulangerie> instead. They were delicious!

We walked to Saint-Servan. On the way there we passed the cruise ship called <National Geographic Orion>. It has been moored in the basin since Sunday. Last year we checked the price of the cruise and it seemed very expensive to us.

national-geographic-orion-in-the-basin

Next we walked over the ecluse/lock and saw a freighter coming into the basin. It was sitting very low in the water so it must have been full of cargo. We proceeded to Saint-Servan to look around at the marché. Our butcher is still on vacation so we could not buy any meat but we could buy black olives. There were few stands outside. The only stand that was interesting contained two baby wild boars.

boar piglet at-the-march-in-saint-servan

The vendor was trying to sell some kind of French lozenge or candy. Sandy did not taste any of the samples because the man held them in his bare hand. She did find the boars interesting to look at.

After returning to the Intra-Muros we enjoyed a coffee at <Charley’s Bar>. It was very windy outside the walls but inside the sun was shining and the wind was blocked. A lovely day to sit outside! There were many people driving around but few people walking around. We watched the worker install the housing sign on the former bibliothèque (library) which is now a housing unit.

le mercredi 13 septembre 2017 – Wednesday September 13, 2017

Yeah! <La Fournee Malouine Boulangerie> was open today. Click here to read about the bakery on Trip Advisor. The photo you see on the Trip Advisor site is our granite kitchen counter, our butter dish, glass of cranberry juice, red handled knife and white plate. We took the photo and posted it on their site. Yesterday we decided that the <Cathedral Boulangerie> does have the best croissants here in the Intra-Muros. But, <La Fournee Malouine> has the best baguette. We buy a baguette <Le Festival> which has a very crispy crust but is soft in the center.

la-festival-baguette-from-la-fournee-malouine

The forecast for today is heavy rain and strong wind until after 15h00. Sandy had books due today at the Mediathéque so our plan was to be there when it opened at 10h00 since the rain was predicted after 11h00. We stepped out of our apartment building and it immediately started to sprinkle. By the time we arrived at the library and got off the bus it was raining enough that we needed our umbrellas.

inside the mediathèque / library

Same thing on our return trip. However once we walked through the walls, the rain had almost stopped. The rain resumed and kept up continuously the rest of the afternoon. Good thing we had library books to keep us occupied.

le jeudi 14 septembre 2017 – Thursday September 14, 2017

Two weeks left – boo hoo! Sandy bought our usual croissants for breakfast but today included a croissant almond. See the photo that she took. They are made from croissant dough, have a thin layer of custard and almonds, dusted with powdered sugar lots of butter and sliced almonds on top. They were delicious!! It is cold today. The temperature was 9C / 48F. It rained off and on until lunch time. Sandy hung some laundry on the balcony but after a few minutes of sun brought it inside when it started to rain again.

After lunch the sun came out and it was beautiful. We took the bus to the <Carrefour Hypermarche> at the <La Madeleine Center>. We wanted to recycle Brita filters and printer cartridge filters. They take both items that the smaller grocery stores don’t accept. We also bought some caramel sauce to have with apples and white dryer sheets that Sandy folds between the clean sheets and towels over the winter. In 2014 she had used blue dryer sheets only to find out that the blue comes off onto the fabric after a while. She had lots of laundry to do while trying to remove the stain a blue dryer sheet made.

le vendredi 15 septembre 2017 – Friday September 15, 2017

It was cold today! The temperature was 10C / 50F when we walked to catch the bus. It was not raining on our way to the bus stop, but as a precaution we had umbrellas with us and wore our rain coats. It was almost time for the bus to arrive and it started raining even though the sun was shining. We boarded the bus at 9h36 and Sandy took this photo of the rainbow over the ramparts.

arc en ciel – rainbow

We spent two hours tutoring with Christine and walked back to catch the bus. It had rained while we were at her house but it stopped for our walk. We sit in her dining room looking out the window at her garden for tutoring. We spotted two Pies (magpies) hopping around. They are fun to watch.

Pie – magpie

le samedi 16 septembre 2017 – Saturday September 16, 2017

It was unusually quiet this morning. Sandy bought our breakfast and made it home before rain shower began. It was raining in the front of our apartment with the sun out, the basin side but not in the back of our building or the ocean side. It only lasted for less than one minute but we still find it unique.

This weekend was <European Heritage Days>.

The European Heritage Days offer a tremendous opportunity to discover public and private buildings that open their doors for the first time or in an exceptional way, revealing their backstage, their unique history or their secret collections.

Many buildings all over France are open to the public for free.

tour-solidor

We walked to Saint-Servan to visit the <Tour Solidor> which is a lovely ancient tower (from the 14th century) with panoramic views.

tour-solidor – our selfie at the top of the tour solidor

There is a museum inside the tower.  There are 6 levels in the tower and each level has a display and information.

MUSEUM OF CAPE HORNIER dedicated to long-haul sailing trips (late nineteenth, early twentieth century). Models, charts, instruments

We returned to Saint-Malo along the beach at low tide and stopped at the <Porte de Dinan> to see the <Association Doris Emeraude Rance> which is a local group that invite the public to discover these long narrow boats used for cod fishing in Newfoundland. Doris boats were originally made in Massachusetts USA in the 19th century. The sun was brilliant and the temperature had risen. We enjoyed a small glass of cider while sitting at the harbor. It was a beautiful day!

Around dinner time, we had to turn the heat on in our apartment. The temperature was down to 18.5C / 65F in the apartment.  Outside, it was rainy and cool. We are able to turn on the heat in each room separately so our bedroom and the living room felt great!

The usual delicious desserts from <La Fournee Malouine Boulangerie>.

le dimanche 17 septembre 2017 – Sunday September 17, 2017

The apartment was much more comfortable this morning. On Sandy’s way back from buying our breakfast she kept hearing someone tapping on a window. She kept looking up and around but didn’t see anyone. Finally she realized there was a gull sitting in the window of an apartment tapping on the kitchen window. It must have been waiting to have breakfast served out of the window.

After breakfast we toured the Mayor’s Office in the <Hotel de Ville>. It was open today as part of the <European Heritage Days>.

Hotel de Ville entrance

fireplace in the mayor’s meeting room

After the Hotel de Ville tour, we enjoyed a coffee in <La Licorne> (the Unicorn) restaurant in the <Place Chateaubriand>.

Stopped at <La Licorne> restaurant for a coffee

After that, we waited for a parade of old cars that was to begin around 12h30.  We had enjoyed the parade in the past. Unfortunately, they didn’t arrive even though we waited for 30 minutes later than the scheduled visit.  However, Sandy did see a snail taking in the sun on a flower right next to us.

Snail on a flower in the Saint-Vincent esplanade area

This evening we had two delicious desserts from <La Fournee Malouine Boulangerie>.

Desserts from <La Fournee Malouine Boulangerie>