Vacation in France

IECB (European Institute of Chemistry and Biology), Bordeaux

We had a feeling that this year we needed a relaxing vacation without too many planned activities. Thus, when it was confirmed that Tue was going to a conference in Bordeaux in the beginning of July, we decided it might as well be there we had our vacation - that would also give us an opportunity to practice our French a bit. When the conference was over Lisbeth showed up in southern France and we moved into a cosy little flat we rented for the purpose.

Bridge over the Garonne river

Not surprisingly it is warmer in Bordeaux than in Stockholm - especially when there's a heatwave in Bordeaux. Therefore it was not shocking that it was extremely popular to cool down by the water mirror at Place de la Bourse.

The water mirror at Place de la Bourse

As expected we spent most of our time there reading books, relaxing on the sofa, watching movies, walking around in the old parts of town by the river, relaxing in parks, shopping at the market, cooking, eating a lot (perhaps even too much) cheese and drinking locally produced red wine.

Our 'loot' from the big Sunday market

Stuffed ball-round zucchini - a variation over these two recipes

Of course we added to that a couple of visits to museums - of which we would particularly like to mention the very interesting video exhibition 6 milliards d'autres, shown in impressive fashion in an old submarine base. We also found the time for a couple of day trips, but more about those later..

La base sous-marine - the old submarine base