Canal.

So this morning my fabulous friend Nicole in Espondeilhan sent me a link to the new Bikram Yoga Studio in Montpellier which opens on 1st July with the words "Now you really can come back!!" So I've been indulging in some serious reminiscing about the time when our family lived in France:

Thanks to my husband's pedantic diarising of the entire eight months we were away, I know for a fact that today, two years ago, we were cycling along the Canal du Midi:

We had lunch by the canal at Poilhes, at the picture perfect, restaurant La Tour Sarracine:

And this is what I ate. Scallop risotto with truffle shavings:

Followed by cuisse de lapin:

Et pour le désert, chocolate fondant with choc/mint ice cream:

I can still remember how it tasted utterly delicious. Sitting out in the Languedoc sunshine on a beautiful blue afternoon:

We went to the same restaurant at the end of our stay, for lunch the day before I checked into the hospital in Beziers for Camelia's birth. No sunshine that day as it was the middle of winter. So we sat inside and Tobes fed  bits of his steak hache to the restaurant dog:

This would never happen in Hobart as dogs aren't allowed to be within a one metre radius of the outside of any restaurant, let alone inside. It really is a long way between Tasmania and France. Especially as we now travel with not three but four children. Having previously negotiated all of the challenges that you face when you move your family to France for 8 months - visas, the language, schools, shop opening hours, bureaucracy AND having a baby - I would do it all again.....in a heartbeat. And I'm sure the rest of my family would too.

R