Shiromi’s Diary

Petit détour par Paris pour le boulot et une brève visite de nuit, autour de la pyramide du Louvre.

Pour ces quelques vacances à la japonaise (comprenez "courtes"), Eiko et moi sommes partis en France pour 10 jours, en compagnie de la sœur d'Eiko et de sa famille. Cela m'a permis de jouer un peu au guide touristique (pour le peu que je connais!) et franchement, de trouver un peu de satisfaction à arriver à parler à n'importe qui dans les boutiques, restaurants et se faisant comprendre du premier coup (fait qui n'est pas encore assuré au Japon!)

La balade commence par Paris, où nous avons fait un tour rapide par le Champ de Mars pour aller voir la Tour Eiffel, sans trop nous attarder, puisque nous avions rendez-vous avec mon frère et son épouse pour un brunch puis une balade non loin de l'Ile de la Cité.

De là, quelques photos de Notre-Dame, en jetant un coup d'œil rapide aux bouquinistes sur les bords de la Seine, on traverse l'Ile Saint-Louis, pour déguster les glaces de Berthillon, pour finalement arriver à l'hôtel de Sully, avant de s'arrêter pour le reste de l'après-midi dans le parc au milieu du Jardin des Vosges.

Pour la Bretagne, nous avons choisi de rester dans le Château de Richeux (les Maisons de Bricourt), un hôtel et restaurant du guide Relais et Châteaux, qui propose des chambres avec vue sur la baie du Mont Saint-Michel et sur Dinard. Le restaurant propose aussi un somptueux plateau de fruits de mer, que même à quatre, nous avons eu bien du mal à terminer.

La vue de la chambre est particulièrement appréciable, d'autant plus que nous avons eu droit à une jolie percée de soleil au réveil, à marée basse.

Pour le jour suivant, passage à Saint-Malo, la cité corsaire, dans laquelle les balades dans la vieille ville sont toujours un plaisir.

La plage de Saint-Malo.

Finalement, pour la troisième partie de ces vacances, nous nous sommes rendus à Bordeaux, pour visiter Saint-Emilion et son église, ses vieilles maisons, et leurs toits, dont on a une très belle vue depuis la partie supérieure du village.

Finalement, pour combler cette journée, nous avons déjeuné à l'Hostellerie de Plaisance, un autre restaurant classé dans le groupe Relais et Châteaux, probablement un des meilleurs restaurants où je suis allé, avec évidemment pour Saint-Emilion, d'excellents vins de Bordeaux (j'ai particulièrement apprécié le Château Les Grandes Murailles, un Grand Cru de Saint Emilion).

Le restaurant propose par ailleurs de prendre le café sur la terrasse, qui surplombe la place principale et offre une vue imprenable sur le donjon "castel daou rey", (château du roi, seul vestige de l'ancien château du roi).

Au passage, le site de Robert Parker, une référence pour les œnologues.

Le reste des photos se trouve dans les galeries France 2007 publique et privée.

Quelques vues de Paris, lors de mon passage éclair dans la capitale pour affaires. Le temps maussade m'a vraiment fait regretter de ne pas être à Tokyo pendant cette période, mais j'ai aussi eu ma dose de hanami, avec ces sakuras parisiens, même si ce n'est franchement la même chose... Voici d'autres photos prises dans le quartier de La Défense, à l'Opéra de Paris et à Montmartre.

Je n'ai franchement pas eu l'occasion d'en prendre beaucoup plus, à cause de mon emploi du temps chargé et du temps peu clément. J'ai en revanche une bonne collection de photos de collègues du bureau, prises lors de nos soirées arosées, que je posterai sous peu.

Like each year, I went back to France for a quick trip of 2 weeks, unsually short for a home leave, but I must say that Eiko and I really optimized our time and managed to make the best of our holidays to visit friends, relatives, etc., especially for the ones who couldn't come to our wedding ceremony last April.

We obviously stayed for a few days in Bordeaux with my family, then quickly went to Marsac, close to Perigueux to visit Rudy, Caroline and of course the lovely Lucille.

Rudy also took us around in Perigueux for a highly optimized 40-minutes tour, as my brother and his wife had to catch a train.

The following day was spent in the beautiful city of Sarlat, a Unesco world heritage, a bit too crowded to my taste this year though.

The town, while once wealthy, has been denied any more fundings during MiddleAge and was therefore unable to carry on any architectural work.
Although renovated since then (as the town has become a Unesco World heritage), Sarlat is still made of stone and has kept intact the charm of the old French towns.

Lacanau, famous for its surf world championship, was our next destination, as we were invited by my uncle to spend the day there in his apartment.
It was a bit cloudy on that day, but the overcast only increased the dramatic effect of the Atlantic ocean and did not impact the pleasure of a nice walk on the beach.

Back to Paris, we took the opportunity to celebrate our first wedding anniversary (September 4th for those who had forgotten!) in a nice restaurant in town.
We did want to go to a relais & châteaux restaurant, but most of them were either closed on Saturday so we ended up booking a table at the Hotel de Vigny, which was not really listed as a restaurant in the reference book, but the meal we had there was just sublime, and I would highly recommend it, as prices are not exorbitant either and the service was also very nice.

Finally, the last day in Paris was spent in the Musée d'Orsay, famous for its exhibition of impressionism art, where we spent the whole day, while I though we would only spend a couple of hours!

The museum itself is a former train station, which makes its architecture very interesting, while being able to host hundreds of pieces of art, spread accross several floors.

It took us nearly 6 hours to visit everything we were interested in, taking into accounts the few breaks we had to take to take some rest!

Shortly before going back home, we dropped by Notre-Dame de Paris, where an impressive ceremony was being held.

All the pictures are in the Gallery.

I've just realized that I still hadn't put up some of the pictures I had taken during my trip to France in late 2002.

All the pictures taken in France were taken in Saint-Emilion (Unesco World Heritage) by a cold but sunny day.
Saint-Emilion is of course well-known by wine amateurs, but it is also a beautiful medieval city where you can find excellent French restaurants.

Additionally, I included 3 pictures taken in London during a one-day trip to visit some friends

Some pictures which stayed for too long on my hard disk because I didn't have time to upload them (or more likely, I was too lazy to do so ;P): the pictures I took in France during my holidays 2002. Part of them are already on the site: Gael and Stephanie's birthday but I still had to upload the ones I took while I was on holidays.

On the same trip, I also had the opportunity to visit my colleagues of the France Dream Team and to drink, laugh and sing while having an impressive couscous ! Wazaaaahhh !

Also, some pictures of nice places in Tokyo or around, in the mountains.

I took some holidays in October 2001 to go back to France and see my family and friends. Against all my expectations, the weather was great and very warm (well ... for that season ... even in Britanny !!) and most of the clothes I had brought with me (turtlenecks, etc.) stayed the whole time in the suitcase ... Oh well, I'm not going to complain since it made the trip very pleasant.

By the way, those were taken with my 3rd digital camera, a Canon EOS D30 ... Awesome !