My mother is visiting us at the moment, staying at the hotel at the end of our road and spending most of the day with us.
Mostly, we are carrying on as usual, with my partner studying at home and at university (she has exams coming up soon). We’ve been to the January sales, had a couple of nice lunches and been to the Friday and Sunday markets. However, we have done a few touristy things as well.
Bayeux is a very different place in January that when we visited last September. Instead of being packed with tourists, we had the town to ourselves. The staff in the Tourist Information we delighted to have tourists to talk to!
My mum really enjoyed having a look round some of the old medieval parts of town and loved the cathedral, even if it was no warmer inside than outside in the icy wind.
The highlight was our visit to the Bayeux Tapestry – something my mother has always wanted to visit. In the summer there were nearly a hundred people looking at the 230 foot-long tapestry. In January it was just me and my mum.
It was a real privilege to have an entire UNESCO world heritage site for our own private viewing.
We really enjoy having visitors. It is, of course, a reminder of our life in the UK, but it is a nice way to share our new life in France and is an opportunity for us to reflect on what we do and what we’ve learned.
My mum will get to meet some real French people when she and my partner go to a French ladies’ English cooking afternoon. I know my mum is a bit nervous as she doesn’t speak any French, but it will be an experience that other English tourists would not normally have.
