In June 2003, after our plane landed at Paris CDG airport — twenty-one years ago today — the first place we went to was Rouen, in Normandy. I had worked there for a year in the 1970s as a teaching assistant in the town's Lycée Corneille. Friends who lived there said they would put us up for a week while we were getting over jet lag.
As it turned out, 2003 was the year of the grande canicule (the great heat wave or "dog days") in France, which lasted into August. You can see from the skies in these pictures how beautiful the weather already was. In the picture on the left above, you can see Walt with our dog Collette, who was traveling with us back then.
The gothic church you see in these pictures is the third church built on this same site. The earlier ones were either demolished over the centuries or destroyed by file. The lycée where I worked in the early '70s is a short walk from the église Saint-Ouen so I walked by it nearly every day for that school year.
I wish our June weather this year resembled the June weather of 2003, but if wishes were fishes... well, you know.
21, old enough to drink.
ReplyDeleteLOL
DeleteI remember seeing the effects of that drought- it was awful.
ReplyDeleteIt was awful. We didn't know if we would survive, having just arrived from chilly, gray, foggy San Francisco.
DeleteI must get to Rouen! Beautiful pictures.
ReplyDeleteBettyAnn
Rouen is worth the trip, but don't expect blue skies and sun
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