The beginning of our roadtrip: Chartres Labyrinth

Great day for driving!

Hicham and I decided to go on a little road trip.  That is why I haven't blogged in a few days.  It was inspired because we could leave on Friday during the day, which would make the trip worth it.  We had to spend Friday morning at the Prefecture (after going there for even 10 minutes, you feel like you need a vacation!) to get my new green card.  That requires it's own post, and in order to keep this one positive, we will just move on...

So, after going to the prefecture, getting road-trip snacks, packing up the car and going to the doctor to discover that I do indeed have carpel tunnel, we hit the road! Destination: The beach!

 But before heading to the magnificent West coast, we had a couple of fun stops to make on the way.  It is about 4 hours from Paris to Saint Malo Beach.  Since it was also a Friday (and on the way), I wanted to visit Chartes again, home of the famous labyrinth - also the one that I have tattooed on my right shoulder. They usually have it covered in chairs, except on Fridays.  I am sure I am not alone in not understanding this since it seems that a)it is totally beautiful b)they market this as a reason to come c)there are more chairs already available than there are people in the entire village and d) it is the Chartes Labyrinth!  Many books have been written about it and it is more famous than the church itself, so the only day it is walkable being Friday is absurd.  As always, to see the BIGGER version, click on the picture.

But anyway, it was Friday and so we went!  Here is the church from far away:

Here is one of the cute cobblestone paths

The gorgeous Chartres Cathedral built 1893-1250:



































We were very fortunate to get there before they started putting the chairs back on at 6:00 pm.  Sabine got to 'walk' it on my back in the backpack.  Hicham enjoyed it too.  Shortly after we finished, the man put just enough chairs on the it to deter anyone from taking the journey.  So, we took pictures:

Sabine Arabella

Me and my girl

climbing the pillars.

I really love walking labyrinths.  It is really an incredible experience.  I would like to go again to return and walk it again but with my ipod and some nice music.  People chattering around me were distracting.  It was still nice though to share with Sabine even if all she wanted to do was run between the rows of chairs and climb the pillars.

On our way back to the car, we saw some cool stuff:

A doll repair shop

A man's lingerie shop called "Sweet Homme"

A locally owned cozy tea/coffee shop

Hicham in front of someone's hobbit door

After Chartes we drove to Le Mans because I saw another blogger's post about it and I was intrigued.  We also stayed the night there at a little hotel called "Mister Bed".  I would post pics, but at the moment it seems that my SD memory card is unreadable. I am hoping that Hicham can work his magic and so I can retrieve the hundreds of photos of I took during the trip for the next post.  It was a really picturesque weekend and I hope to share the highlights!  But, so far, here is what I have because I took these pics with the Lumix and not the Nikon.