It is Sunday April 24, two days after our journey to Rennes, but we still seem to be in recovery mode.  A nice short walk to a vide-grenier / garage sale will be just fine.

Sunday April 24, 2016 is cool and cloudy.  The predicted high temperature is 10 C / 50 F.  We planned to walk to a vide-grenier / garage sale in Saint-Servan this morning.  The sale is being held by the Little Sisters of the Poor.

Just before we left for Saint-Servan, we discovered that our glass coffee carafe was broken.  Sandy had washed it and didn’t notice a missing section from the side.  She had to drain the water from the sink to find the broken piece.  So that’s the first item we wanted to buy today if possible.

It was quite windy as we walked across the bridge over the ecluse/lock.  We noticed a tug boat pushing a barge coming towards the lock/ecluse.  The barge had just been emptied from the dredging going on in the harbor.  We hurried over the bridge just before the warning alarm sounded prior to the bridge being closed to allow boats to go into the lock.

barge and tug

tug pushing the barge

We decided to take a slightly different path on the way to the vide-grenier and passed the same church three different times.  Sandy thought she knew the location for the sale, but apparently not. Finally, using her iPhone we found it.  The whole time we were looking we were within a 5 minute walk.  It was on a street we’d never been on before.

There were many large wooden ancient armoires for sale for 25€, lots of books, household items and many new items of clothing.  Sandy found a Krups brand hand mixer.  Phil asked one of the Sisters if the mixer worked and then had a short conversation with her.  She asked if we were American and told us they had “orders” in several USA cities.  She was a member of the Little Sisters of the Poor and they had branches in Chicago, San Francisco, New York, Newark and several other cities on the east coast.   She was originally from England, but had lived in France for the last 50 years.  The mixer worked and included “dough” beaters and regular beaters.  Phil found a fleece pull over, fleece hat and scarf, all brand new.  The price for all four items was 10€. No luck on finding a replacement coffee carafe, so we’ll have to shop for a new one tomorrow.

On the way back to our apartment it rained.  So we arrived slightly damp and had to dry everything out for about the 5th time this year.  We were exhausted and Phil discovered that we’d walked over 8.9 km / 5.5 mi today and been gone for 2 and 1/2 hours. To see a map of the walk we took today, click on this link.

The rain we had experienced earlier was the result of a front passing through.  After the front passed through, the weather stayed cool, but there was sunshine all afternoon.

At around 15:30 / 3:30 PM we enjoyed the tomato farcie we had purchased at the butcher yesterday.  With it we had salad and couscous.  Very, very good.

For the rest of the afternoon we searched online for a replacement glass coffee carafe.  We think the Carrefour Hypermarche, the Conforama, or the Darty store at the La Madeleine Center will have a replacement. We’ll find out tomorrow morning.

We heard a soft knock at the door and its was Madame Lavogez from the 5th floor (6th floor USA) inviting us for an aperitif at her apartment tomorrow evening.  Looking forward to that!